Kinkajou interviews 
Trevor Jamieson
(A.E. Van Vogt: The War Against The Rull)
Kinkajou: Tell us about the existence of humanity in your era.
Trevor Jamieson: Man has conquered space and spread throughout the galaxy. In the galaxy, exist many civilisations of wildly varying lifeforms on several thousand plants which are joined in a vast confederation. The situation was expedited when our existence was threatened by a paranoid race – The Rull.
These are a life form so alien that they may have come from another galaxy. The “Rull” were man’s equal in intelligence and they have a technology which may in fact be superior.
We have never been able to dislodge the “Rull” from any planet where they have become established.
On the contrary, they drove us from three important bases, within a year of our first contact a century ago, before we realised the deadliness of the danger and resolved to stand firm everywhere regardless of losses.
On every planet of the several hundred we have been able to visit in secret inhabited by the” Rull”, no other creatures of sufficient intelligence of organise resistance has ever been found. The question then arises “what happened to them?”
Kinkajou: It sounds like these aliens have forced many of the remaining lifeforms in our galaxy to work together.
Trevor Jamieson: It has been a difficult road to follow. I remember the telepathic Ezwals of Carson's world. I made one of the representatives an offer. Will you tell your fellow Ezwals that we will leave your planet if they would develop a machine civilisation with which they can defend the planet from the “Rull?”
He replied that Ezwals would never agree to be slaves to machines. There was so much determination and oppositional thought that I could only nod my acceptance of the other’s reality. Adult Ezwals were emotionally set in the pattern that was probably millions of years in the making. The trap they were in was one from which they could not escape without assistance.
Although they are a powerful and intelligent race with much to offer our confederation, they were committed to appearing as simple savage animals. One cornered me when it had escaped and killed all the crew of my ship except for myself. It told me “out of the entire human race, only you know that the Ezwals of what you know as Carson’s planet are not senseless beasts, but are intelligent beings”.
“He told me that he knew that our government is having great difficulty in settling or keeping columnists on the planet because the Ezwals were regarded as a sort of natural force, very dangerous to cope with but unavoidable. That was the way they wanted the situation to remain.”
Kinkajou: But surely they could see that technology was necessary to save their paradise?
Trevor Jamieson: The Ezwals believe that adaptation to a difficult environment is the logical goal of the superior being. Humans have created what they call civilisation, which is in fact merely a material barrier between themselves and their environment.
The barrier is so complex and unwieldy that merely keeping it going occupies the entire existence of the race. The Ezwals felt that individually, man is a frivolous and unsuspecting slave as he spends his life in subservience to artificiality and dies wretchedly of some flaw in his disease ridden body.
And it is this arrogant weakling with his insatiable will to dominance that is the greatest existing danger to the sane, self-reliant races of the universe.
Kinkajou: It can be seen that mankind’s version of a technological paradise would appear to be a type of hell for the Ezwals. But in examining the situation, only one form of life even has a chance of survival. To have your world occupied by the “Rull” would do your species to extinction should the “Rull” at any time choose to remove the threat to their dominance from either a senseless beast or an intelligent competitor.
The human race may face extinction
many times in its history.
Trevor Jamieson: The Ezwal was totally unable to appreciate my point of view. He pushed me into the world of the hostile jungle and suggested that I would be free to exercise my argumentative powers on any jungle denizens I chanced to meet.
Kinkajou: A difficult situation I think compounded by hostility. We all have our own individual ideas of paradise for ourselves and for our own species. For instance, we two intelligent beings here facing each other, I do think feel the kinship that exist between all intelligence, once it is in communication.
The capacity for Intelligence and civilisation automatically creates empathy of purpose between sapients, no matter their individual goals. We can at least observe and admire our individual versions of Paradise, though we seek a different Paradise for ourselves.
Paradise Game
Van Vogt, A.E.
Trevor Jamieson
War Against the Rull
.....
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Kinkajou interviews Trevor Jamieson
(A.E. Van Vogt: The War Against The Rull)
Kinkajou: Tell us about the existence of humanity in your era.
Trevor Jamieson: Man has conquered space and spread throughout the galaxy. In the galaxy, exist many civilisations of wildly varying lifeforms on several thousand plants which are joined in a vast confederation. The situation was expedited when our existence was threatened by a paranoid race – The Rull.
These are a life form so alien that they may have come from another galaxy. The “Rull” were man’s equal in intelligence and they have a technology which may in fact be superior.
We have never been able to dislodge the “Rull” from any planet where they have become established.On the contrary, they drove us from three important bases, within a year of our first contact a century ago, before we realised the deadliness of the danger and resolved to stand firm everywhere regardless of losses.
On every planet of the several hundred we have been able to visit in secret inhabited by the” Rull”, no other creatures of sufficient intelligence of organise resistance has ever been found. The question then arises “what happened to them?”
Kinkajou: It sounds like these aliens have forced many of the remaining lifeforms in our galaxy to work together.
Trevor Jamieson: It has been a difficult road to follow. I remember the telepathic Ezwals of Carson's world. I made one of the representatives an offer. Will you tell your fellow Ezwals that we will leave your planet if they would develop a machine civilisation with which they can defend the planet from the “Rull?”
He replied that Ezwals would never agree to be slaves to machines. There was so much determination and oppositional thought that I could only nod my acceptance of the other’s reality. Adult Ezwals were emotionally set in the pattern that was probably millions of years in the making. The trap they were in was one from which they could not escape without assistance.
Although they are a powerful and intelligent race with much to offer our confederation, they were committed to appearing as simple savage animals. One cornered me when it had escaped and killed all the crew of my ship except for myself. It told me “out of the entire human race, only you know that the Ezwals of what you know as Carson’s planet are not senseless beasts, but are intelligent beings”.
“He told me that he knew that our government is having great difficulty in settling or keeping columnists on the planet because the Ezwals were regarded as a sort of natural force, very dangerous to cope with but unavoidable. That was the way they wanted the situation to remain.”
Kinkajou: But surely they could see that technology was necessary to save their paradise?
Trevor Jamieson: The Ezwals believe that adaptation to a difficult environment is the logical goal of the superior being. Humans have created what they call civilisation, which is in fact merely a material barrier between themselves and their environment.
The barrier is so complex and unwieldy that merely keeping it going occupies the entire existence of the race. The Ezwals felt that individually, man is a frivolous and unsuspecting slave as he spends his life in subservience to artificiality and dies wretchedly of some flaw in his disease ridden body.
And it is this arrogant weakling with his insatiable will to dominance that is the greatest existing danger to the sane, self-reliant races of the universe.
Kinkajou: It can be seen that mankind’s version of a technological paradise would appear to be a type of hell for the Ezwals. But in examining the situation, only one form of life even has a chance of survival. To have your world occupied by the “Rull” would do your species to extinction should the “Rull” at any time choose to remove the threat to their dominance from either a senseless beast or an intelligent competitor.
The human race may face extinction
many times in its history.
Trevor Jamieson: The Ezwal was totally unable to appreciate my point of view. He pushed me into the world of the hostile jungle and suggested that I would be free to exercise my argumentative powers on any jungle denizens I chanced to meet.
Kinkajou: A difficult situation I think compounded by hostility. We all have our own individual ideas of paradise for ourselves and for our own species. For instance, we two intelligent beings here facing each other, I do think feel the kinship that exist between all intelligence, once it is in communication.
The capacity for Intelligence and civilisation automatically creates empathy of purpose between sapients, no matter their individual goals. We can at least observe and admire our individual versions of Paradise, though we seek a different Paradise for ourselves.
Paradise Game |
Van Vogt, A.E. |
Trevor Jamieson |
War Against the Rull |
.....You can help us do our work if you just tell one new person about something valuable you found on our site.
You can help us help the world if you just tell one new person about something valuable you learned on our site.