The Trial of Hari Seldon 1/3

http://dinhe.net/~aredridel/.notmine/Isaac_Asimov-Foundation.pdf

Q. Let us see, Dr. Seldon. How many men are now engaged in the project of

which you are head?

A. Fifty mathematicians.

Q. Including Dr. Gaal Dornick?

A. Dr. Dornick is the fifty-first,

Q. Oh, we have fifty-one then? Search your memory, Dr. Seldon. Perhaps

there are fifty-two or fifty-three? Or perhaps even more?

A. Dr. Dornick has not yet formally joined my organization. When he does,

the membership will be fifty-one. It is now fifty, as I have said.

Q. Not perhaps nearly a hundred thousand?

A. Mathematicians? No.

Q. I did not say mathematicians. Are there a hundred thousand in all

capacities?

A. In all capacities, your figure may be correct.

Q. May be? I say it is. I say that the men in your project number

ninety-eight thousand, five hundred and seventy-two.

A. I believe you are counting women and children.

Q. (raising his voice) Ninety eight thousand five hundred and seventy-two

individuals is the intent of my statement. There is no need to quibble.

A. I accept the figures.

Q. (referring to his notes) Let us drop that for the moment, then, and take

up another matter which we have already discussed at some length. Would you

repeat, Dr. Seldon, your thoughts concerning the future of Trantor?

A. I have said, and I say again, that Trantor will lie in ruins within the

next three centuries.

Q. You do not consider your statement a disloyal one?

A. No, sir. Scientific truth is beyond loyalty and disloyalty.

Q. You are sure that your statement represents scientific truth?

A. I am.

Q. On what basis?

A. On the basis of the mathematics of psychohistory.

Q. Can you prove that this mathematics is valid’?

A. Only to another mathematician.

Q. (with a smile) Your claim then is that your truth is of so esoteric a

nature that it is beyond the understanding of a plain man. It seems to me

that truth should be clearer than that, less mysterious, more open to the

mind.

A. It presents no difficulties to some minds. The physics of energy

transfer, which we know as thermodynamics, has been clear and true through

all the history of man since the mythical ages, yet there may be people

present who would find it impossible to design a power engine. People of

high intelligence, too. I doubt if the learned Commissioners-

At this point, one of the Commissioners leaned toward the Advocate. His

words were not heard but the hissing of the voice carried a certain

asperity. The Advocate flushed and interrupted Seldon.

Q. We are not here to listen to speeches, Dr. Seldon. Let us assume that

you have made your point. Let me suggest to you that your predictions of

disaster might be intended to destroy public confidence in the Imperial

Government for purposes of your own.

A. That is not so.

Q. Let me suggest that you intend to claim that a period of time preceding

the so-called ruin of Trantor will be filled with unrest of various types.

A. That is correct.

Q. And that by the mere prediction thereof, you hope to bring it about, and

to have then an army of a hundred thousand available.

A. In the first place, that is not so. And if it were, investigation will

show you that barely ten thousand are men of military age, and none of

these has training in arms.

Q. Are you acting as an agent for another?

A. I am not in the pay of any man, Mr. Advocate.

Q. You are entirely disinterested? You are serving science?

A. I am.

The Trial of Hari Seldon 2/3

Q. Then let us see how. Can the future be changed, Dr. Seldon?

A. Obviously. This courtroom may explode in the next few hours, or it may

not. If it did, the future would undoubtedly be changed in some minor

respects.

Q. You quibble, Dr. Seldon. Can the overall history of the human race be

changed?

A. Yes.

Q. Easily?

A. No. With great difficulty.

Q. Why?

A. The psychohistoric trend of a planet-full of people contains a huge

inertia. To be changed it must be met with something possessing a similar

inertia. Either as many people must be concerned, or if the number of

people be relatively small, enormous time for change must be allowed. Do

you understand?

Q. I think I do. Trantor need not be ruined, if a great many people decide

to act so that it will not.

A. That is right.

Q. As many as a hundred thousand people?

A. No, sir. That is far too few.

Q. You are sure?

A. Consider that Trantor has a population of over forty billions. Consider

further that the trend leading to ruin does not belong to Trantor alone but

to the Empire as a whole and the Empire contains nearly a quintillion human

beings.

Q. I see. Then perhaps a hundred thousand people can change the trend, if

they and their descendants labor for three hundred years.

A. I’m afraid not. Three hundred years is too short a time.

Q. Ah! In that case, Dr. Seldon, we are left with this deduction to be made

from your statements. You have gathered one hundred thousand people within

the confines of your project. These are insufficient to change the history

of Trantor within three hundred years. In other words, they cannot prevent

the destruction of Trantor no matter what they do.

A. You are unfortunately correct.

Q. And on the other hand, your hundred thousand are intended for no illegal

purpose.

A. Exactly.

Q. (slowly and with satisfaction) In that case, Dr. Seldon- Now attend,

sir, most carefully, for we want a considered answer. What is the purpose

of your hundred thousand?

The Advocate’s voice had grown strident. He had sprung his trap; backed

Seldon into a comer; driven him astutely from any possibility of answering.

There was a rising buzz of conversation at that which swept the ranks of

the peers in the audience and invaded even the row of Commissioners. They

swayed toward one another in their scarlet and gold, only the Chief

remaining uncorrupted.

Hari Seldon remained unmoved. He waited for the babble to evaporate.

A. To minimize the effects of that destruction.

Q. And exactly what do you mean by that?

A. The explanation is simple. The coming destruction of Trantor is not an

event in itself, isolated in the scheme of human development. It will be

the climax to an intricate drama which was begun centuries ago and which is

accelerating in pace continuously. I refer, gentlemen, to the developing

decline and fall of the Galactic Empire.

The buzz now became a dull roar. The Advocate, unheeded, was yelling, "You

are openly declaring that-" and stopped because the cries of "Treason" from

the audience showed that the point had been made without any hammering.

Slowly, the Chief Commissioner raised his gavel once and let it drop. The

sound was that of a mellow gong. When the reverberations ceased, the gabble

of the audience also did. The Advocate took a deep breath.

Q. (theatrically) Do you realize, Dr. Seldon, that you are speaking of an

Empire that has stood for twelve thousand years, through all the

vicissitudes of the generations, and which has behind it the good wishes

and love of a quadrillion human beings?

A. I am aware both of the present status and the past history of the

Empire. Without disrespect, I must claim a far better knowledge of it than

any in this room.

The Trial of Hari Seldon 3/3

Q. And you predict its ruin?

A. It is a prediction which is made by mathematics. I pass no moral

judgements. Personally, I regret the prospect. Even if the Empire were

admitted to be a bad thing (an admission I do not make), the state of

anarchy which would follow its fall would be worse. It is that state of

anarchy which my project is pledged to fight. The fall of Empire,

gentlemen, is a massive thing, however, and not easily fought. It is

dictated by a rising bureaucracy, a receding initiative, a freezing of

caste, a damming of curiosity - a hundred other factors. It has been going

on, as I have said, for centuries, and it is too majestic and massive a

movement to stop.

Q. Is it not obvious to anyone that the Empire is as strong as it ever was?

A. The appearance of strength is all about you. It would seem to last

forever. However, Mr. Advocate, the rotten tree-trunk, until the very

moment when the storm-blast breaks it in two, has all the appearance of

might it ever had. The storm-blast whistles through the branches of the

Empire even now. Listen with the ears of psychohistory, and you will hear

the creaking.

Q. (uncertainly) We are not here, Dr. Seldon, to lis-

A. (firmly) The Empire will vanish and all its good with it. Its

accumulated knowledge will decay and the order it has imposed will vanish.

Interstellar wars will be endless; interstellar trade will decay;

population will decline; worlds will lose touch with the main body of the

Galaxy. -And so matters will remain.

Q. (a small voice in the middle of a vast silence) Forever?

A. Psychohistory, which can predict the fall, can make statements

concerning the succeeding dark ages. The Empire, gentlemen, as has just

been said, has stood twelve thousand years. The dark ages to come will

endure not twelve, but thirty thousand years. A Second Empire will rise,

but between it and our civilization will be one thousand generations of

suffering humanity. We must fight that.

Q. (recovering somewhat) You contradict yourself. You said earlier that you

could not prevent the destruction of Trantor; hence, presumably, the fall;

-the so-called fall of the Empire.

A. I do not say now that we can prevent the fall. But it is not yet too

late to shorten the interregnum which will follow. It is possible,

gentlemen, to reduce the duration of anarchy to a single millennium, if my

group is allowed to act now. We are at a delicate moment in history. The

huge, onrushing mass of events must be deflected just a little, - just a

little - It cannot be much, but it may be enough to remove twenty-nine

thousand years of misery from human history.

Q. How do you propose to do this?

A. By saving the knowledge of the race. The sum of human knowing is beyond

any one man; any thousand men. With the destruction of our social fabric,

science will be broken into a million pieces. Individuals will know much of

exceedingly tiny facets of what there is to know. They will be helpless and

useless by themselves. The bits of lore, meaningless, will not be passed

on. They will be lost through the generations. But, if we now prepare a

giant summary of all knowledge, it will never be lost. Coming generations

will build on it, and will not have to rediscover it for themselves. One

millennium will do the work of thirty thousand.

Q. All this

A. All my project; my thirty thousand men with their wives and children,

are devoting themselves to the preparation of an "Encyclopedia Galactica."

They will not complete it in their lifetimes. I will not even live to see

it fairly begun. But by the time Trantor falls, it will be complete and

copies will exist in every major library in the Galaxy.