EPILOGUE

   'Their little universe is very young, and its god is still a child. But it is too soon to judge them; when We return in the Last Days, We will consider what should be saved.'

SOURCES AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

SOURCES

   Chapter 1: The Kuiper Belt
   For a description of Captain Chandler's hunting ground, discovered as recently as 1992, see 'The Kuiper Belt' by Jane X. Luu and David C. Jewitt (Scientific American, May 1996)
 
   Chapter 3: Rehabilitation
   I believed that I had invented the palm-to-palm transfer of information, so it was mortifying to discover that Nicholas ("Being Digital") Negroponte (Hodder and Stoughton, 1995) and his MIT Media Lab have been working on the idea for years...
 
   Chapter 4: Star City
   The concept of a 'ring around the world' in the geostationary orbit (CEO), linked to the Earth by towers at the Equator, may seem utterly fantastic but in fact has a firm scientific basis. It is an obvious extension of the 'space elevator' invented by the St Petersburg engineer Yuri Artsutanov, whom I had the pleasure of meeting in 1982, when his city had a different name.
   Yuri pointed out that it was theoretically possible to lay a cable between the Earth and a satellite hovering over the same spot on the Equator which it does when placed in the CEO, home of most of today's communications satellites. From this beginning, a space elevator (or in Yuri's picturesque phrase, 'cosmic funicular') could be established, and payloads could be carried up to the CEO purely by electrical energy. Rocket propulsion would be needed only for the remainder of the journey.
   In addition to avoiding the danger, noise and environmental hazards of rocketry, the space elevator would make possible quite astonishing reductions in the cost of all space missions. Electricity is cheap, and it would require only about a hundred dollars' worth to take one person to orbit. And the round trip would cost about ten dollars, as most of the energy would be recovered on the downward journey! (Of course, catering and inflight movies would put up the price of the ticket. Would you believe a thousand dollars to CEO and back?)
   The theory is impeccable: but does any material exist with sufficient tensile strength to hang all the way down to the Equator from an altitude of 36,000 kilometres, with enough margin left over to raise useful payloads? When Yuri wrote his paper, only one substance met these rather stringent specifications – crystalline carbon, better known as diamond. Unfortunately, the necessary megaton quantities are not readily available on the open market, though in "2061: Odyssey Three" I gave reasons for thinking that they might exist at the core of Jupiter. In "The Fountains of Paradise" I suggested a more accessible source – orbiting factories where diamonds might be grown under zero-gravity conditions.
   The first 'small step' towards the space elevator was attempted in August 1992 on the Shuttle Atlantis, when one experiment involved the release – and retrieval – of a payload on a 21-kilometre-long tether. Unfortunately the playing-out mechanism jammed after only a few hundred metres.
   I was very flattered when the Atlantis crew produced The Fountains of Paradise during their orbital press conference, and Mission Specialist Jeffrey Hoffman sent me the autographed copy on their return to Earth.
   The second tether experiment, in February 1996, was slightly more successful: the payload was indeed deployed to its full distance, but during retrieval the cable was severed, owing to an electrical discharge caused by faulty insulation. This may have been a lucky accident – perhaps the equivalent of a blown fuse:
   I cannot help recalling that some of Ben Franklin's contemporaries were killed when they attempted to repeat his famous – and risky – experiment of flying a kite during a thunderstorm.
   Apart from possible dangers, playing-out tethered payloads from the Shuttle appears rather like fly-fishing: is not as easy as it looks. But eventually the final 'giant leap' will be made – all the way down to the Equator.
   Meanwhile, the discovery of the third form of carbon, buckminsterfullerene (C60) has made the concept of the space elevator much more plausible. In 1990 a group of chemists at Rice University, Houston, produced a tubular form of C60 – which has far greater tensile strength than diamond. The group's leader, Dr Smalley, even went so far as to claim it was the strongest material that could ever exist – and added that it would make possible the construction of the space elevator.
   (Stop Press News: I am delighted to know that Dr Smalley has shared the 1996 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for this work.)
   And now for a truly amazing coincidence – one so eerie that it makes me wonder Who Is In Charge.
   Buckminster Fuller died in 1983, so never lived to see the discovery of the 'buckyballs' and 'buckytubes' which have given him much greater posthumous fame. During one of the last of his many world trips, I had the pleasure of flying him and his wife Anne around Sri Lanka, and showed them some of the locations featured in The Fountains of Paradise. Shortly afterwards, I made a recording from the novel on a 12" (remember them?) LP record (Caedmon TC 1606) and Bucky was kind enough to write the sleeve notes. They ended with a surprising revelation, which may well have triggered my own thinking about 'Star City':
   'In 1951 I designed a free-floating tensegrity ring-bridge to be installed way out from and around the Earth's equator. Within this "halo" bridge, the Earth would continue its spinning while the circular bridge would revolve at its own rate. I foresaw Earthian traffic vertically ascending to the bridge, revolving and descending at preferred Earth loci'
   I have no doubt that, if the human race decides to make such an investment (a trivial one, according to some estimates of economic growth), 'Star City' could be constructed. In addition to providing new styles of living, and giving visitors from low-gravity worlds like Mars and the Moon better access to the Home Planet, it would eliminate all rocketry from the Earth's surface and relegate it to deep space, where it belongs (Though I hope there would be occasional anniversary re-enactments at Cape Kennedy, to bring back the excitement of the pioneering days.)
   Almost certainly most of the City would be empty scaffolding, and only a very small fraction would be occupied or used for scientific or technological purposes. After all, each of the Towers would be the equivalent of a ten-million-floor skyscraper – and the circumference of the ring around the geostationary orbit would be more than half the distance to the Moon! Many times the entire population of the human race could be housed in such a volume of space, if it was all enclosed. (This would pose some interesting logistics problems, which I am content to leave as 'an exercise for the student'.)
 
   Chapter 5: Education
   I was astonished to read in a newspaper on 19 July 1996 that Dr Chris Winter, head of British Telecom's Artificial Life Team, believes that the information and storage device I described in this chapter could be developed within 30 years! (In my 1956 novel The City and the Stars I put it more than a billion years in the future... obviously a serious failure of imagination.) Dr Winter states that it would allow us to 'recreate a person physically, emotionally and spiritually', and estimates that the memory requirements would be about 10 terabytes (10e13 bytes), two orders of magnitude less than the petabyte (10e15 bytes) I suggest.
   And I wish I'd thought of Dr Winter's name for this device, which will certainly start some fierce debates in ecclesiastical circles: the 'Soul Catcher'... For its application to interstellar travel, see following note on Chapter 9.
   For an excellent history of the 'Beanstalk' concept (as well as many other even farther-out ideas such as anti-gravity and space-warps) see Robert L. Forward's "Indistinguishable From Magic" (Baen 1995).
 
   Chapter 7: Infinite Energy
   If the inconceivable energy of the Zero Point Field (sometimes referred to as 'quantum fluctuations' or 'vacuum energy') can ever be tapped, the impact upon our civilization will be incalculable. All present sources of power – oil, coal, nuclear, hydro, solar – would become obsolete, and so would many of our fears about environmental pollution. They would all be wrapped up in one big worry – heat pollution. All energy eventually degrades to heat, and if everyone had a few million kilowatts to play with, this planet would soon be heading the way of Venus – several hundred degrees in the shade.
   However, there is a bright side to the picture: there may be no other way of averting the next Ice Age, which otherwise is inevitable ('Civilization is an interval between Ice Ages' – Will Durant: "The Story of Civilization", Fine Communications, US, 1993)
   Even as I write this, many competent engineers, in laboratories all over the world, claim to be tapping this new energy source. Some idea of its magnitude is contained in a famous remark by the physicist Richard Feynman, to the effect that the energy in a coffee-mug's volume (any such volume, anywhere!) is enough to boil all the oceans of the world. This, surely, is a thought to give one pause. By comparison, nuclear energy looks as feeble as a damp match.
   And how many supernovae, I wonder, really are industrial accidents?
 
   Chapter 9: Skyland
   One of the main problems of getting around in Star City would be caused by the sheer distances involved: if you wanted to visit a friend in the next Tower (and communications will never completely replace contact, despite all advances in Virtual Reality) it could be the equivalent of a trip to the Moon. Even with the fastest elevators this would involve days rather than hours, or else accelerations quite unacceptable to people who had adapted to low-gravity life.
   The concept of an 'inertialess drive' – i.e. a propulsion system that acts on every atom of a body so that no strains are produced when it accelerates – was probably invented by the master of the 'Space Opera', E.E. Smith, in the 1930s. It is not as improbable as it sounds – because a gravitational field acts in precisely this manner.
   If you fall freely near the Earth (neglecting the effects of air resistance) you will increase speed by just under ten metres per second, every second. Yet you will feel weightless – there will be no sense of acceleration, even though your velocity is increasing by one kilometre a second, every minute and a half!
   And this would still be true if you were falling in Jupiter's gravity (just over two-and-a-half times Earth's) or even the enormously more powerful field of a white dwarf or neutron star (millions or billions of times greater). You would feel nothing, even if you had approached the velocity of light from a standing start in a matter of minutes. However, if you were foolish enough to get within a few radii of the attracting object, its field would no longer be uniform over the whole length of your body, and tidal forces would soon tear you to pieces. For further details, see my deplorable but accurately-titled short story 'Neutron Tide' (in "The Wind from the Sun").
   An 'inertialess drive', which would act exactly like a controllable gravity field, had never been discussed seriously outside the pages of science fiction until very recently. But in 1994 three American physicists did exactly this, developing some ideas of the great Russian physicist Andrei Sakharov.
   'Inertia as a Zero-Point Field Lorentz Force' by B. Haisch, A. Rueda & H. F. Puthoff (Physics Review A, February 1994) may one day be regarded as a landmark paper, and for the purposes of fiction I have made it so. It addresses a problem so fundamental that it is normally taken for granted, with a that's-just-the-way-the-universe-is-made shrug of the shoulders.
   The question HR&P asked is: 'What gives an object mass (or inertia) so that it requires an effort to start it moving, and exactly the same effort to restore it to its original state?'
   Their provisional answer depends on the astonishing – and outside the physicists' ivory towers – little-known fact that so-called 'empty' space is actually a cauldron of seething energies – the Zero-Point Field (see note above). HR&P suggest that both inertia and gravitation are electromagnetic phenomena, resulting from interaction with this field.
   There have been countless attempts, going all the way back to Faraday, to link gravity and magnetism, and although many experimenters have claimed success, none of their results has ever been verified. However, if HR&P's theory can be proved, it opens up the prospect – however remote – of anti-gravity, 'space drives' and the even more fantastic possibility of controlling inertia. This could lead to some interesting situations: if you gave someone the gentlest touch, they would promptly disappear at thousands of kilometres an hour, until they bounced off the other side of the room a fraction of a millisecond later. The good news is that traffic accidents would be virtually impossible; automobiles – and passengers – could collide harmlessly at any speed.
   (And you think that today's life-styles are already too hectic?)
   The 'weightlessness' which we now take for granted in space missions – and which millions of tourists will be enjoying in the next century – would have seemed like magic to our grandparents. But the abolition – or merely the reduction – of inertia is quite another matter, and may be completely impossible. [1] But it's a nice thought, for it could provide the equivalent of 'teleportation': you could travel anywhere (at least on Earth) almost instantaneously. Frankly, I don't know how 'Star City' could manage without it...
   One of the assumptions I have made in this novel is that Einstein is correct, and that no signal – or object – can exceed the speed of light. A number of highly mathematical papers have recently appeared suggesting that, as countless science-fiction writers have taken for granted, galactic hitch-hikers may not have to suffer this annoying disability.
   On the whole, I hope they are right – but there seems one fundamental objection. If FTL is possible, where are all those hitchhikers – or at least the well-heeled tourists?
   One answer is that no sensible ETs will ever build interstellar vehicles, for precisely the same reason that we have never developed coal-fuelled airships: there are much better ways of doing the job.
   The surprisingly small number of 'bits' required to define a human being, or to store all the information one could possibly acquire in a lifetime, is discussed in 'Machine Intelligence, the Cost of Interstellar Travel and Fermi's Paradox' by Louis K. Scheffer (Quarterly Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society, Vol. 35, No. 2, June 1994: pp. 157-75). This paper (surely the most mind-stretching that the staid QJRAS has published in its entire career!) estimates that the total mental state of a 100-year-old human with a perfect memory could be represented by 10 to the 15th bits (one petabit). Even today's optical fibres could transmit this amount of information in a matter of minutes.
   My suggestion that a Star Trek transporter would still be unavailable in 3001 may therefore appear ludicrously shortsighted a mere century from now [2] and the present lack of interstellar tourists is simply due to the fact that no receiving equipment has yet been set up on Earth. Perhaps it's already on its way by slow-boat...
 
   Chapter 15: Falcon
   It gives me particular pleasure to pay this tribute to the crew of Apollo 15. On their return from the Moon they sent me the beautiful relief map of Falcon's landing site, which now has pride of place in my office. It shows the routes taken by the Lunar Rover during its three excursions, one of which skirted Earthlight Crater. The map bears the inscription: 'To Arthur Clarke from the crew of Apollo 15 with many thanks for your visions of space. Dave Scott, Al Worden, Jim Irwin.' In return, I have now dedicated "Earthlight" (which, written in 1953, was set in the territory the Rover was to drive over in 1971): 'To Dave Scott and Jim Irwin, the first men to enter this land, and to Al Worden, who watched over them from orbit.'
   After covering the Apollo 15 landing in the CBS studio with Walter Cronkite and Wally Schirra, I flew to Mission Control to watch the re-entry and splashdown. I was sitting beside Al Worden's little daughter when she was the first to notice that one of the capsule's three parachutes had failed to deploy. It was a tense moment, but luckily the remaining two were quite adequate for the job.
 
   Chapter 16: Asteroid 7794
   See Chapter 18 of "2001: A Space Odyssey" for the description of the probe's impact. Precisely such an experiment is now being planned for the forthcoming Clementine 2 mission.
   I am a little embarrassed to see that in my first Space Odyssey the discovery of Asteroid 7794 was attributed to the Lunar Observatory – in 1997! Well, I'll move it to 2017 – in time for my 100th birthday.
   Just a few hours after writing the above, I was delighted to learn that Asteroid 4923 (1981 EO27), discovered by S. J. Bus at Siding Spring, Australia, on 2 March 1981, has been named Clarke, partly in recognition of Project Spaceguard (see "Rendezvous with Rama" and "The Hammer of God"). I was informed, with profound apologies, that owing to an unfortunate oversight Number 2001 was no longer available, having been allocated to somebody named A. Einstein. Excuses, excuses.
   But I was very pleased to learn that Asteroid 5020, discovered on the same day as 4923, has been named Asimov – though saddened by the fact that my old friend could never know.
 
   Chapter 17: Ganymede
   As explained in the Valediction, and in the Author's Notes to "2010 Odyssey Two" and "2061 Odyssey Three", I had hoped that the ambitious Galileo Mission to Jupiter and its moons would by now have given us much more detailed knowledge – as well as stunning close-ups – of these strange worlds.
   Well, after many delays, Galileo reached its first objective – Jupiter itself – and is performing admirably. But, alas, there is a problem – for some reason, the main antenna never unfolded. This means that images have to be sent back via a low-gain antenna, at an agonizingly slow rate. Although miracles of onboard computer reprogramming have been done to compensate for this, it will still require hours to receive information that should have been sent in minutes.
   So we must be patient – and I was in the tantalizing position of exploring Ganymede in fiction just before Galileo started to do so in reality, on 27 June 1996.
   On 11 July 1996, just two days before finishing this book, I downloaded the first images from JPL; luckily nothing – so far! -contradicts my descriptions. But if the current vistas of cratered ice-fields suddenly give way to palm trees and tropical beaches – or, worse still, YANKEE GO HOME signs, I'll be in real trouble .
   I am particularly looking forward to close-ups of 'Ganymede City' (Chapter 17). This striking formation is exactly as I described it – though I hesitated to do so for fear that my 'discovery' might be front-paged by the National Prevaricator. To my eyes it appears considerably more artificial than the notorious 'Mars Face' and its surroundings. And if its streets and avenues are ten kilometres wide – so what? Perhaps the Medes were BIG...
   The city will be found on the NASA Voyager images 20637.02 and 20637.29, or more conveniently in Figure 23.8 of John H. Rogers's monumental "The Giant Planet Jupiter" (Cambridge University Press, 1995).
 
   Chapter 19: The Madness of Mankind
   For visual evidence supporting Khan's startling assertion that most of mankind has been at least partially insane, see Episode 22, 'Meeting Mary', in my television series Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious Universe. And bear in mind that Christians represent only a very small subset of our species: far greater numbers of devotees than have ever worshipped the Virgin Mary have given equal reverence to such totally incompatible divinities as Rama, Kali, Siva, Thor, Wotan, Jupiter, Osiris, etc. etc....
   The most striking – and pitiful – example of a brilliant man whose beliefs turned him into a raving lunatic is that of Conan Doyle. Despite endless exposures of his favourite psychics as frauds, his faith in them remained unshaken. And the creator of Sherlock Holmes even tried to convince the great magician Harry Houdini that he 'dematerialized' himself to perform his feats of escapology – often based on tricks which, as Dr Watson was fond of saying, were 'absurdly simple'. (See the essay 'The Irrelevance of Conan Doyle' in Martin Gardner's "The Night is Large", St Martin's Press, US, 1996.)
   For details of the Inquisition, whose pious atrocities make Pol Pot look positively benign, see Carl Sagan's devastating attack on New Age Nitwittery, "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark" (Headline, 1995). I wish it – and Martin's book – could be made required reading in every high school and college.
   At least the US Department of Immigration has taken action against one religion-inspired barbarity. Time Magazine ('Milestones', 24 June 1996) reports that asylum must now be granted to girls threatened with genital mutilation in their countries of origin.
   I had already written this chapter when I came across Anthony Storr's "Feet of Clay: A Study of Gurus" (HarperCollins, 1996), which is a virtual textbook on this depressing subject. It is hard to believe that one holy fraud, by the time the US Marshals belatedly arrested him, had accumulated ninety-three Rolls-Royces! Even worse – eighty-three per cent of his thousands of American dupes had been to college, and thus qualify for my favourite definition of an intellectual: 'Someone who has been educated beyond his/her intelligence.'
 
   Chapter 26: Tsienville
   In the 1982 preface to "2010: Odyssey Two", I explained why I named the Chinese spaceship which landed on Europa after Dr Tsien Hsue-shen, one of the founders of the United States and Chinese rocket programmers. As Iris Chang states in her biography "Thread of the Silkworm" (Basic Books, 1995) 'his life is one of the supreme ironies of the Cold War'.
   Born in 1911, Tsien won a scholarship which brought him from China to the United States in 1935, where he became student and later colleague of the brilliant Hungarian aerodynamicist Theodore von Karman. Later, as first Goddard Professor at the California Institute of Technology, he helped establish the Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory – the direct ancestor of Pasadena's famed Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
   With top secret clearance, he contributed greatly to American rocket research in the 1950s, but during the hysteria of the McCarthy era was arrested on trumped-up security charges when he attempted to pay a visit to his native China. After many hearings and a prolonged period of arrest, he was finally deported to his homeland – with all his unrivalled knowledge and expertise. As many of his distinguished colleagues affirmed, it was one of the most stupid (as well as most disgraceful) things the United States ever did.
   After his expulsion, according to Thuang Fenggan, Deputy Director, China National Space Administration, Tsien 'started the rocket business from nothing... Without him, China would have suffered a twenty-year lag in technology.' And a corresponding delay, perhaps, in the deployment of the deadly 'Silkworm' anti-ship missile and the 'Long March' satellite launcher.
   Shortly after I had completed this novel, the International Academy of Astronautics honoured me with its highest distinction, the von Karman Award – to be given in Beijing! This was an offer I couldn't refuse, especially when I learned that Dr Tsien is now a resident of that city. Unfortunately, when I arrived there I discovered that he was in hospital for observation, and his doctors would not permit visitors.
   I am therefore extremely grateful to his personal assistant, Major-General Wang Shouyun, for carrying suitably inscribed copies of 2010 and 2061 to Dr Tsien. In return the General presented me with the massive volume he has edited, "Collected Works of H. S. Tsien: 1938-1956" (1991, Science Press, 16, Donghuangcheggen North Street, Beijing 100707). It is a fascinating collection, beginning with numerous collaborations with von Karman on problems in aerodynamics, and ending with solo papers on rockets and satellites. The very last entry, 'Thermonuclear Power Plants' (Jet Propulsion, July 1956) was written while Dr Tsien was still a virtual prisoner of the FBI, and deals with a subject that is even more topical today – though very little progress has been made towards 'a power station utilizing the deuterium fusion reaction'.
   Just before I left Beijing on 13 October 1996 I was happy to learn that, despite his current age (85) and disability, Dr Tsien is still pursuing his scientific studies. I sincerely hope that he enjoyed "2010" and "2061", and look forward to sending him this "Final Odyssey" as an additional tribute.
 
   Chapter 36: Chamber of Horrors
   As the result of a series of Senate Hearings on Computer Security in June 1996, on 15 July 1996 President Clinton signed Executive Order 13010 to deal with 'computer-based attacks on the information or communications components that control critical infrastructures ("cyber threats").' This will set up a task force to counter cyberterrorism, and will have representatives from the CIA, NSA, defense agencies, etc.
   Pico, here we come...
 
   Since writing the above paragraph, I have been intrigued to learn that the finale of the movie Independence Day, which I have not yet seen, also involves the use of computer viruses as Trojan horses! I am also informed that its opening is identical to that of Childhood's End (1953), and that it contains every known science-fiction cliche´ since Me´lie`s's Trip to the Moon (1903).
   I cannot decide whether to congratulate the script-writers on their one stroke of originality – or to accuse them of the transtemporal crime of pre-cognitive plagiarism. In any event, I fear there's nothing I can do to stop John Q. Popcorn thinking that I have ripped off the ending of ID4.
 
   The following material has been taken – usually with major editing – from the earlier books in the series:
   From "2001 A Space Odyssey": Chapter 18 Through the Asteroids and Chapter 37 Experiment.
   From "2010: Odyssey Two": Chapter 11 Ice and Vacuum; Chapter 36 Fire in the Deep: Chapter 38 Foamscape.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

   My thanks to IBM for presenting me with the beautiful little Thinkpad 755CD on which this book was composed. For many years I have been embarrassed by the – totally unfounded -rumour that the name HAL was derived by one-letter displacement from IBM. In an attempt to exorcise this computer-age myth, I even went to the trouble of getting Dr Chandra, HAL's inventor, to deny it in 2010 Odyssey Two. However, I was recently assured that, far from being annoyed by the association, Big Blue is now quite proud of it. So I will abandon any future attempts to put the record straight – and send my congratulations to all those participating in HAL's 'birthday party' at (of course) the University of Illinois, Urbana, on 12 March 1997.
   Rueful gratitude to my Del Rey Books editor, Shelly Shapiro, for ten pages of niggles which, when dealt with, made a vast improvement to the final product. (Yes, I've been an editor myself, and do not suffer from the usual author's conviction that the members of this trade are frustrated butchers.)
   Finally, and most important of all: my deepest thanks to my old friend Cyril Gardiner, Chairman of the Galle Face Hotel, for the hospitality of his magnificent (and enormous) personal suite while I was writing this book: he gave me a Tranquillity Base in a time of troubles. I hasten to add that, even though it may not provide such extensive imaginary landscapes, the facilities of the Galle Face are far superior to those offered by the 'Grannymede', and never in my life have I worked in more comfortable surroundings.
   Or, for that matter, in more inspirational ones, for a large plaque at the entrance lists more than a hundred of the Heads of State and other distinguished visitors who have been entertained here. They include Yuri Gagarin, the crew of Apollo 12 – the second mission to the Moon's surface – and a fine collection of stage and movie stars: Gregory Peck, Alec Guinness, Noel Coward, Carrie Fisher of "Star Wars" fame... As well as Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier – both of whom make brief appearances in "2061 Odyssey Three" (Chapter 37). I am honoured to see my name listed among them.
   It seems appropriate that a project begun in one famous hotel – New York's Chelsea, that hotbed of genuine and imitation genius – should be concluded in another, half a world away. But it's strange to hear the monsoon-lashed Indian Ocean roaring just a few yards outside my window, instead of the traffic along far-off and fondly remembered 23rd Street.

IN MEM0RIAM: 18 SEPTEMBER 1996

   It was with the deepest regret that I heard – literally while editing this acknowledgements – that Cyril Gardiner died a few hours ago. It is some consolation to know that he had already seen the above tribute and was delighted with it.

VALEDICTION

   'Never explain, never apologize' may be excellent advice for politicians, Hollywood moguls and business tycoons, but an author should treat his readers with more consideration. So, though I have no intention of apologizing for anything, perhaps the complicated genesis of the Odyssey Quartet requires a little explaining.
   It all began at Christmas 1948 – yes, 1948! – with a 4,000-word short story which I wrote for a contest sponsored by the British Broadcasting Corporation. 'The Sentinel' described the discovery of a small pyramid on the Moon, set there by some alien civilization to await the emergence of mankind as a planet-faring species. Until then, it was implied, we would be too primitive to be of any interest. [3] The BBC rejected my modest effort, and it was not published until almost three years later in the one-and-only (Spring 1951) issue of 10 Story Fantasy – a magazine which, as the invaluable "Encyclopaedia of Science Fiction" wryly comments, is 'primarily remembered for its poor arithmetic (there were 13 stories)'.
   'The Sentinel' remained in limbo for more than a decade, until Stanley Kubrick contacted me in the spring of 1964 and asked if I had any ideas for the 'proverbial' (i.e. still non-existent) 'good science-fiction movie'. During the course of our many brainstorming sessions, as recounted in "The Lost Worlds of 2001" (Sidgwick and Jackson, 1972) we decided that the patient watcher on the Moon might provide a good starting point for our story. Eventually it did much more than that, as somewhere during production the pyramid evolved into the now famous black monolith.
 
   To put the Odyssey series in perspective, it must be remembered that when Stanley and I started planning what we privately called 'How the Solar System was Won' the Space Age was barely seven years old, and no human had travelled more than a hundred kilometres from the home planet. Although President Kennedy had announced that the United States intended to go to the Moon 'in this decade', to most people that must still have seemed like a far-off dream. When filming started just west of London [4] on a freezing 29 December 1965, we did not even know what the lunar surface looked like at close quarters. There were still fears that the first word uttered by an emerging astronaut would be 'Help!' as he disappeared into a talcum-power-like layer of moondust. On the whole, we guessed fairly well: only the fact that our lunar landscapes are more jagged than the real ones – smoothed by aeons of sand-blasting by meteoric dust – reveals that 2001 was made in the pre-Apollo era.
   Today, of course, it seems ludicrous that we could have imagined giant space-stations, orbiting Hilton Hotels, and expeditions to Jupiter as early as 2001. It is now difficult to realize that back in the 1960s there were serious plans for permanent Moon bases and Mars landings – by 1990! Indeed, in the CBS studio, immediately after the Apollo 11 launch, I heard the Vice-President of the United States proclaim exuberantly: 'Now we must go to Mars!'
   As it turned out, he was lucky not to go to prison. That scandal, plus Vietnam and Watergate, is one of the reasons why these optimistic scenarios never materialized.
   When the movie and book of "2001 A Space Odyssey" made their appearance in 1968, the possibility of a sequel had never crossed my mind. But in 1979 a mission to Jupiter really did take place, and we obtained our first close-ups of the giant planet and its astonishing family of moons.
   The Voyager space-probes [5] were, of course, unmanned, but the images they sent back made real – and totally unexpected – worlds from what had hitherto been merely points of light in the most powerful telescopes. The continually erupting sulphur volcanoes of Io, the multiply-impacted face of Callisto, the weirdly contoured landscape of Ganymede – it was almost as if we had discovered a whole new Solar System. The temptation to explore it was irresistible; hence 2010 Odyssey Two, which also gave me the opportunity to find out what happened to David Bowman, after he had awakened in that enigmatic hotel room.
 
   In 1981, when I started writing the new book, the Cold War was still in progress, and I felt I was going out on a limb – as well as risking criticism – by showing a joint US-Russian mission. I also underlined my hope of future co-operation by dedicating the novel to Nobelist Andrei Sakharov (then still in exile) and Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov – who, when I told him in 'Star Village' that the ship would be named after him, exclaimed, with typical ebullience, 'Then it will be a good ship!'
   It still seems incredible to me that, when Peter Hyams made his excellent film version in 1983, he was able to use the actual close-ups of the Jovian moons obtained in the Voyager missions (some of them after helpful computer processing by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, source of the originals). However, far better images were expected from the ambitious Galileo mission, due to carry out a detailed survey of the major satellites over a period of many months. Our knowledge of this new territory, previously obtained only from a brief flyby, would be enormously expanded – and I would have no excuse for not writing "Odyssey Three".
   Alas – something tragic on the way to Jupiter. It had been planned to launch Galileo from the Space Shuttle in 1986 – but the Challenger disaster ruled out that option, and it soon became clear – precisely as was done by Discovery in the book version of 2001 – that we would get no new information from Io and Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, for at least another decade.
   I decided not to wait, and the (1985) return of Halley's Comet to the inner Solar System gave me an irresistible theme. Its next appearance in 2061 would be good timing for a third Odyssey, though as I was not certain when I could deliver it I asked my publisher for a rather modest advance. It is with much sadness that I quote the dedication of "2061 Odyssey Three":
   Obviously there is no way in which a series of four science-fiction novels, written over a period of more than thirty years of the most breathtaking developments in technology (especially in space exploration) and politics, could be mutually consistent. As I wrote in the introduction to 2061: 'Just as 2010 was not a direct sequel to 2001, so this book is a not a linear sequel to 2010. They must all be considered as variations on the same theme, involving many of the same characters and situations, but not necessarily happening in the same universe.' If you want a good analogy from another medium, listen to what Rachmaninoff and Andrew Lloyd Webber did to the same handful of notes by Paganini.
   So this "Final Odyssey" has discarded many of the elements of its precursors, but developed others – and I hope more important ones – in much greater detail. And if any readers of the earlier books feel disorientated by such transmutations, I hope I can dissuade them from sending me angry letters of denunciation by adapting one of the more endearing remarks of a certain US President: 'It's fiction, stupid!'
   And it's all my own fiction, in case you hadn't noticed. Though I have much enjoyed my collaborations with Gentry Lee, [6] Michael Kube-McDowell and the late Mike McQuay – and won't hesitate again to call on the best hired guns in the business if I have future projects that are too big to handle myself – this particular Odyssey had to be a solo job.
 
   So every word is mine: well, almost every word, I must confess that I found Professor Thirugnanasampanthamoorthy (Chapter 35) in the Colombo Telephone Directory; I hope the present owner of that name will not object to the loan. There are also a few borrowings from the great Oxford English Dictionary. And what do you know – to my delighted surprise, I find it uses no fewer than 66 quotations from my own books to illustrate the meaning and use of words!
   Dear OED, if you find any useful examples in these pages, please be my guest – again.
   I apologize for the number of modest coughs (about ten, at last count) in this Afterword; but the matters to which they drew attention seemed too relevant to be omitted.
   Finally, I would like to assure my many Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Jewish and Muslim friends that I am sincerely happy that the religion which Chance has given you has contributed to your peace of mind (and often, as Western medical science now reluctantly admits, to your physical well-being).
   Perhaps it is better to be un-sane and happy, than sane and un-happy. But it is best of all to be sane and happy.
   Whether our descendants can achieve that goal will be the greatest challenge of the future. Indeed, it may well decide whether we have any future.
 
   Arthur C. Clarke
   Colombo, Sri Lanka
   19 September 1996

footnotes
   1.As every Trekker knows, the Starship Enterprise uses 'inertial dampers' to solve this particular problem. When asked how these work, the series' technical advisor gave the only possible answer: 'very well, thank you.' (See "The Physics of Star Trek" by Lawrence Krauss: HarperCollins, 1996.)
 
   2.However, for a diametrically opposing view, see the above-mentioned "Physics of Star Trek".
 
   3.The search for alien artefacts in the Solar System should be a perfectly legitimate branch of science ('exo-archaeology'?). Unfortunately, it has been largely discredited by claims that such evidence has already been found – and has been deliberately suppressed by NASA! It is incredible that anyone would believe such nonsense: far more likely that the space agency would deliberately fake ET artefacts – to solve its budget problems! (Over to you, NASA Administrators...)
 
   4.At Shepperton, destroyed by the Martians in one of the most dramatic scenes in wells's masterpiece, The War of the Worlds.
 
   5.Which employed a 'slingshot' or 'gravity-assist' manoeuvre by flying close to Jupiter.
 
   6.By an unlikely coincidence, Gentry was Chief Engineer on the Galileo and Viking projects. (See Introduction to Rama II). It wasn't his fault that the Galileo antenna didn't unfurl...

Klark Artur

BOŽIJI ČEKIĆ
Prevod: Živković Mirjana/Živković Zoran

Clarke Arthur HAMMER OF GOD (THE), 1993.


POLARIS
1993.

PRVI SUSRET: OREGON, 1972.

     Bila je veličine omanje kuće, težila je devet hiljada tona i kretala se brzinom od pedeset hiljada kilometara na čas. Dok je prolazila iznad Velikog Tetonskog nacionalnog parka, jedan spretni turista fotografisao je usijanu vatrenu loptu i njen dugački trag pare. Za manje od dva minuta prosekla je Zemljinu atmosferu i vratila se u svemir.
     Da je došlo do i najmanje promene njene orbite tokom više milijardi godina koliko već kruži oko Sunca moglo se desiti da padne na bilo koji od velikih zemaljskih gradova... i izazove eksploziju petostruko jaču od one koju je načinila bomba što je uništila Hirošimu.
     Bilo je to 10. avgusta 1972.

1. IZ AFRIKE

     Kapetan Robert Sing uživao je u tim šetnjama kroz šumu sa svojim malim sinom Tobijem. Bila je to, razume se, pripitomljena i blaga šuma, zajemčeno bez opasnih životinja, ali predstavljala je uzbudljivu suprotnost njihovom poslednjem boravištu u arizonskoj pustinji. Kao prvo, prijalo im je što su tako blizu okeana, prema kome su svi svemirci gajili duboko usađenu empatiju. Čak i ovde, na ovoj čistini koja se nalazila više od kilometra duboko u kopnu, mogao je da čuje slabo hučanje talasa što ih je monsun bacao na spoljašnji greben.
     "Šta je ono, tata?" upitao je četvorogodišnjak, pokazavši prstom na malo, kosmato lice, uokvireno belim zulufima, koje je zurilo u njih kroz zastor od lišća.
     "Ovaj... neka vrsta majmuna. Zašto ne upitaš Mozak?"
     "Pitao sam. Neće da odgovori."
     Još jedan problem, pomisli Sing. Bilo je trenutaka kada je čeznuo za jednostavnim životom svojih predaka u prašnjavim ravnicama Indije, mada je savršeno dobro znao da bi mogao da ga podnese samo koju milisekundu.
     "Pokušaj ponovo, Tobi. Ponekad govoriš suviše brzo... Kućna centrala ti ne prepozna uvek glas. Da li si se setio da pošalješ sliku? Ne može ti reći u šta gledaš ako i sam to isto ne vidi."
     "Auuuh! Zaboravio sam."
     Sing pozva privatni kanal svoga sina, taman na vreme da uhvati odgovor centrale.
     "To je beli kolobus, porodica cercopithecidae..."
     "Hvala, Mozgu. Mogu li da se igram s njim?"
     "Mislim da to nije dobra ideja", žurno se umeša Sing. "Mogao bi da te ujede. A verovatno ima i buve. Tvoje roboigračke mnogo su lepše."
     "Nisu onako lepe kao Tigreta."
     "Ali zato nisu ni tolika napast... čak i sada kada je isdresirana za život u kući, hvala Bogu. Ionako je vreme da pođemo kući." I da vidimo kako Frejda, dodao je u sebi, izlazi na kraj sa svojim problemima u pogledu Centrale...
     Od samog trenutka kada je Služba nebeskog prevoza spustila kuću u Afriku, usledio je niz kvarova. Poslednji, i verovatno najozbiljniji, desio se na sistemu za recikliranje hrane. Iako su jemčili da ne postoji mogućnost da se pokvari, tako da je rizik od stvarnog trovanja bio astronomski mali, sinoćnji file-minjon imao je nekakav čudan, metalan ukus. Frejda je, napravivši grimasu, predložila da se vrate na život iz vremena preelektronskih lovaca-sakupljača, da spremaju hranu nad vatrom od drva. Ponekad je njen smisao za humor bio pomalo bizaran: sama pomisao da jede prirodno meso raskomadanih mrtvih životinja bila je, razume se, krajnje ogavna...
     "Zar ne možemo do plaže?"
     Tobija, koji je najveći deo života proveo okružen peskom, očaravalo je more; nije uspevao još da poveruje da na jednom mestu može postojati toliko vode. Čim severnoistočni monsun popusti, otac će ga povesti do grebena i pokazati mu čudesa koja su sada skrivali pobesneli talasi.
     "Da čujemo šta majka ima da nam kaže."
     "Majka kaže da je vreme da se obojica vratite kući. Zar ste zaboravili da nam popodne dolaze posetioci? Tobi... soba ti je u kršu. Vreme je da je ti spremiš... a ne da to stalno ostavljaš Dorkasi."
     "Ali programirao sam je..."
     "Bez rasprave. Kući... obojica!"
     Tobijeva usta počeše da se puće na dobro poznat način. Međutim, bilo je trenutka kada je disciplina bila važnija od ljubavi: kapetan Sing podiže Tobija u naručje i krenu nazad prema kući sa svojim tovarom koji se blago migoljio. Tobi je bio suviše težak da bi ga dugo nosio, ali opiranje mu je ubrzo prestalo i ocu je bilo drago što je mogao da ga pusti da nastavi na vlastiti pogon.
     Dom koji su delili Robert Sing, Frejda Kerol, njihov sin, Tobi, njegov voljeni minitigar i odabrani roboti delovao bi iznenađujuće skučeno kakvom posetiocu iz prethodnog veka... pre bi se moglo reći da je to bila kakva vikendica nego kuća. Međutim, u ovom slučaju izgled je i te kako varao, jer je većina soba bila mnogonamenska; bilo je dovoljno izdati naređenje pa da se svaka od njih preobrati u nešto drugo. Nameštaj bi doživeo metamorfozu, zidovi i tavanica bi nestali i bili zamenjeni prizorima zemlje i neba... Ili čak svemira, dovoljno uverljivim da obmanu svakog osim kakvog astronauta.
     Kompleks koji se sastojao od središnje kupole i četiri poluvaljkasta krila nije bio, Sing je to morao priznati, vrlo privlačan za gledanje i delovao je sasvim neprikladno na ovoj čistini u džungli. Ali savršeno mu je odgovarao opis 'Mašina u kojoj se živi'; Sing je proveo gotovo ceo odrasli deo života u takvim mašinama, često pri nultoj gravitaciji. On se ne bi osećao prijatno ni u kakvom drugom okruženju.
     Prednja vrata su se smotala naviše i prema njima je suknula zlatasta izmaglica. Tobi je raširenih ruku potrčao da pozdravi Tigretu.
     Ali nikada se nisu sreli; jer ovo je bila stvarnost od pre trideset godina koja se odigrala na mestu udaljenom pola milijarde kilometara.

2. SUSRET SA KALI

     Kada se neuralni plejbek okončao, zvuk, viđenje, miris nepoznatog cveća i nežni dodir vetra na njegovoj koži mlađoj nekoliko desetina godina namah su iščileli i kapetan Sing se ponovo obreo u kabini na svemirskom tegljaču Golijat, dok su Tobi i njegova majka ostali na svetu koji on nikada više neće moći da poseti. Godine provedene u svemiru... i zanemarivanje obaveznih vežbi pri nultoj gravitaciji... toliko su ga oslabili da je sada mogao da hoda samo na Mesecu i Marsu. Gravitacija ga je izgnala sa planete na kojoj je rođen.
     "Još jedan sat do susreta, kapetane", izgovorio je tih, ali uporan glas; bio je to David, kako je neizbežno nazvan centralni brodski kompjuter. "Aktivno stanje po vašem zahtevu. Vreme je da odložite memnočipove i da se vratite u stvarni svet."
     Golijatov zapovednik osetio je kako ga preplavljuje talas tuge kada se poslednja slika iz izgubljene prošlosti rastočila u bezobličnu, uzavrelu izmaglicu bele buke. Prebrzi prelazak iz jedne u drugu stvarnost predstavljao je dobar recept za šizofreniju, tako da je kapetan Sing uvek ublažavao šok najprijatnijim zvukom za koji je znao... zvukom talasa koji nežno zapljuskuju plažu, uz glasanje galebova u daljini. Bilo je to još jedno sećanje na život koji je izgubio i na mirnu prošlost koju je sada zamenila užasavajuća stvarnost.
     Još nekoliko trenutaka odložio je suočavanje sa strašnom odgovornošću. Zatim je uzdahnuo i skinuo neuronsku ulaznu kapu koja mu je sasvim prianjala uz glavu. Poput svih svemiraca, kapetan Sing je pripadao školi 'Ćelavost je divna', ako ni zbog čega drugog ono stoga što je kosa predstavljala silnu gnjavažu pri nultoj gravitaciji. Istoričari još nisu mogli da se pomire sa činjenicom da je jedan izum, 'prenosivi mozak', 'Brainman' - kovanica nastala po uzoru na 'Walkman'; prim. prev. uspeo da izmeni izgled ljudskog roda za samo jednu deceniju... i izdigne drevnu umetnost pravljenja perika do statusa jedne od glavnih industrijskih grana.
     "Kapetane", oglasi se David. "Znam da ste tu. Ili želite da ja preuzmem?"
     Bila je to stara šala nadahnuta svim onim suludim kompjuterima iz romana i filmova ranog elektronskog doba. David je posedovao iznenađujuće dobar smisao za humor: uostalom, uživao je status legalne osobe (neljudsko biće) - to jest, potpadao je pod čuveni Stoti Amandman... i posedovao je... ili prevazilazio... gotovo sve osobine svojih tvoraca. Međutim, postojale su čitave senzorne i emocionalne oblasti u koje nije mogao da zađe. Nisu smatrali za potrebno da ga opskrbe čulima mirisa i ukusa, mada to ne bi bilo teško učiniti. I svi njegovi pokušaji da priča bezobrazne viceve već na početku bi propali, tako da je ubrzo napustio taj žanr.
     "U redu je, Davide", odvrati kapetan. "I dalje ja upravljam." Skinuo je masku sa očiju, otro suze koje su se nekako nagomilale i nevoljno se okrenuo prema osmatračkom prozoru. A tamo, u prostoru ispred njega, počivala je Kali.
     Izgledala je krajnje bezopasno... samo jedan u nizu malih asteroida, čiji je oblik u toj meri podsećao na kikiriki da je sličnost delovala gotovo komično. Nekoliko velikih kratera nastalih prilikom sudara, kao i na stotine sićušnih, nasumce je bilo raštrkano po njenoj površini crnoj kao ugalj. Nije bilo nikakvih vizuelnih nagoveštaja na osnovu kojih bi mogle da joj se naslute razmere, ali Sing je njene dimenzije znao napamet: maksimalana dužina 1295 metara, najmanja širina 656 metara; Kali bi se veoma lako uklopila u mnoge gradske parkove.
     Nikakvo čudo što još i sada pretežan deo čovečanstva i dalje ne može da poveruje da ona predstavlja oruđe sudnjeg dana. Ili, kako su je hrišlamski fundamentalisti nazvali, 'Božiji čekić'.

     Često je isticano da je kao uzor za komandni most na Golijatu poslužio onaj sa svemirskog broda Enterprajz: posle veka i po, Zvezdane staze i dalje su, s vremena na vreme, s ljubavlju oživljavane. Predstavljale su podsetnik na prostodušni osvit svemirskog ere, kada su ljudi snevali da će moći da prkose zakonima fizike i jure po Vaseljeni brže od same svetlosti. Međutim, nije pronađen nikakav način da se prekorači ta brzinska granica koju je utvrdio Ajnštajn... i mada je dokazano da postoje 'crvotočine u svemiru', ništa, makar bilo i veličine atomskog jezgra, nije moglo da prođe kroz njih. Uprkos tome, san o stvarnom osvajanju međuzvezdanih prečica nije sasvim zgasnuo.
     Kali je ispunila glavni osmatrački ekran. Nije bilo potrebno nikakvo uvećanje, jer je Golijat počivao svega dve stotine metara iznad njene drevne, orošavele površine. Ona je sada, prvi put tokom svog postojanja, dobila posetioce.
     Mada je zapovednikova povlastica bila da prvi kroči na svaki devičanski svet, kapetan Sing odredio je za spuštanje tri druga člana posade koji su imali više iskustva u vanbrodskim delatnostima. Nije želeo da gubi vreme: veliki deo ljudske rase gledao ih je i čekao na presudu koja će odlučiti o sudbini Zemlje.
     Nemoguće je hodati po manjim asteroidima; gravitacija je tako slaba da nepažljivi istraživač lako može postići drugu kosmičku brzinu i naći se na nezavisnoj orbiti. Zbog toga je jedan član kontaktnog tima nosio čvrsto odelo na samostalni pogon opremljeno spoljašnjim rukama za hvatanje. Ostala dvojica vozila su se na malim svemirskim sankama koje su se lako mogle pobrkati sa onima što su se koristile na Arktiku.
     Kapetan Sing i dvanaest oficira koji su se okupili oko njega na komandnom mostu Golijata nisu gnjavili ekipu koja se otisnula na asteroid nepotrebnim pitanjima ili savetima; učinili bi to samo u slučaju opasnosti.
     Sanke su dodirnule vrh jedne krupne gromade, nekoliko puta veće od nih samih, podigavši pri tom upečatljiv oblak prašine.
     "Spustili smo se, Golijate! Vidim golu stenu. Da bacimo sidro?"
     "Čini mi se da mesto nije ništa lošije od ostalih. Samo napred."
     "Bušilica uključena... izgleda da lako prodire... zar ne bi bilo divno da nabasamo na naftu?"
     Na mostu se začulo nekoliko prigušenih uzdaha. Ovakve glupe šale služile su da smanji napetost i Sing ih je podsticao. Od trenutka susreta došlo je do izvesne promene u moralu posade, raspoloženje je nepredvidljivo osciliralo između zlovolje i mladalačke razdraganosti... 'zviždukanje pored groblja' kako je to privatno nazivala brodska lekarka. Već je bila prepisala sredstva za smirenje u jednom blagom slučaju manijakalno-depresivnih simptoma. A biće sve gore tokom nedelja i meseci koji su pred njima.
     "Antena postavljena... uključujemo radio-far... kakvi su signali?"
     "Glasni i jasni."
     "Dobro. Sada Kali više neće moći da se sakrije."
     Razume se, nije postojala ni najmanja mogućnost da izgube Kali... što je bio čest slučaj u prošlosti sa asteroidima na koje se nije budno motrilo. Nijedna orbita nikada nije bila kompjuterski izrađena sa većom pažnjom, ali i dalje je postojala izvesna neizvesnost. Još nije sasvim bila isključena mogućnost da Božiji čekić promaši nakovanj.
     Sada su džinovski radio-teleskopi na Zemlji i tamnoj strani Meseca čekali da prime impulse uključenog radio-fara, podešeni na hiljaditi deo milionitog dela milionitog dela jedne sekunde. Protećiće više od dvadeset minuta pre nego što oni stignu na svoje odredište, stvorivši nevidljiv merni štap koji će odrediti Kalinu putanju do u centimetre.
     Nekoliko sekundi kasnije, kompjuteri 'Svemirskog čuvara' izrećiće svoju presudu: život ili smrt. Ali protećiće skoro ceo sat pre nego što vest stigne nazad do Golijata.
     Počelo je prvo razdoblje čekanja.

DRUGI SUSRET: TUNGUZIJA, SIBIR, 1908.

     Kosmički ledeni breg stigao je iz pravca Sunca, tako da ga niko nije video kako se približava sve dok nebo nije eksplodiralo. Nekoliko sekundi kasnije, udarni talas sravnio je sa zemljom dve hiljade kvadratnih kilometara borove šume i najbučniji zvuk od erupcije Krakataua stao je da kruži svetom.
     Da je kritični deo komete zakasnio samo dva sata na svom putovanju dugom vekovima, udar od deset megatona zbrisao bi Moskvu i izmenio tok istorije.
     Bilo je to 30. juna 1908.

SVEMIRSKI ČUVAR

     'Svemirski čuvar' predstavljao je jedan od poslednjih projekata legendarne NASA-e, tamo pri kraju dvadesetog veka. Početni cilj bio je krajnje skroman: da se izvrši što je moguće podrobnije osmatranje asteroida i kometa koje seku putanju Zemlje i da se utvrdi da li koji od njih predstavlja moguću pretnju. Naziv projekta... uzet iz jednog mračnog naučnofantastičnog romana iz dvadesetog veka... mogao je zavesti; kritičari su voleli da ističu kako bi 'Svemirska straža' ili 'Svemirsko upozorenje' bili mnogo primereniji.
     Kako je ukupni budžet retko kad prekoračivao sumu od deset miliona dolara godišnje, mreža teleskopa koja je pokrivala ceo svet - čijom su glavninom upravljali vešti amateri - postavljena je do dve hiljadite godine. Šezdeset jednu godinu kasnije, spektakularni povratak Halejeve komete doveo je do povećanja fonda, a velika vatrena lopta iz 2079. - koja je srećom pala usred Atlantika - pribavila je 'Svemirskom čuvaru' dodatni prestiž. Do kraja veka locirano je više od milion asteroida i verovalo se da je obavljeno preko devedeset posto osmatranja. Međutim, ono će morati da bude nastavljeno u nedogled: uvek je postojala mogućnost da iz nepoznatih spoljnih prostranstava Sunčevog sistema dojuri kakav nezvani gost.
     Kao što je to učinila Kali krajem 2109. kada se sjurila u pravcu Sunca, presekavši orbitu Saturna.

3. KAMENJE SA NEBA

     "Ovde, u Beloj Kući, nije bilo okupljeno toliko nadarenih ljudi još od vremena kada je Tomas Džeferson tu sam obedovao."

     Predsednik Džon Kenedi u obraćanju delegaciji naučnika Sjedinjenih Država.

     "Pre bih poverovao da su dvojica profesora Jenkija slagala nego da kamenje može da pada sa neba."

     Izjava predsednika Tomasa Džefersona pošto je saslušao izveštaj o padu meteorita u Novoj Engleskoj.

     "Meteoriti ne padaju na Zemlju. Oni padaju na Sunce... a Zemlja im se samo ispreči na putu."

     Džon V. Kembel

     U drevnom svetu bilo je dobro znano da kamenje zaista može da pada sa neba, mada je verovatno dolazilo do neslaganja oko toga koji od bogova ga je ispustio. I ne samo kemenje, već i veoma cenjeni metal - gvožđe. Pre pronalaska topljenja metala, meteoriti su predstavljali osnovni izvor ovog vrednog elementa: nije stoga čudo da su oni postali sveti i da su često idolopoklonički štovani.
     Međutim, prosvetljeniji mislioci osamnaestog veka, 'Doba Razuma', nisu verovali u takve praznoverne gluposti. Tako je, Francuska akademija nauka izdala rezoluciju u kojoj je objasnila da su meteoriti potpuno zemaljskog porekla. Ako se dogodi da dođu sa neba, to je zato što predstavljaju proizvod munja - sasvim razumljiva pogreška. I tako su kustosi evropskih muzeja pobacali bezvredno kamenje koje su njihovi neuki preci strpljivo sakupljali.
     Igrom jedne od najveličanstvenijih ironija u istoriji nauke, samo nekoliko godina po izdavanju proglasa Francuske akademije veliki roj meteorita pao je nekoliko kilometara od Pariza u prisustvu sasvim pouzdanih svedoka. Akademija je morala žurno da izda opoziv.
     Međutim, veličina i potencijalna važnost meteorita nije bila shvaćena sve do osvita svemirske ere. Decenijama su naučnici dovodili u sumnju - pa čak i poricali - da su meteoriti odgovorni za bilo koju veću formaciju na Zemlji. Gotovo je neverovatno, ali pojedini geolozi i dalje su verovali, kada smo već dobrano zakoračili u dvadeseti vek, da je čuveni 'Meteorski krater' u Arizoni pogrešno nazvan... tvrdili su da je vulkanskog porekla! Tek kada su svemirske sonde pokazale da su Mesec i većina manjih tela u Sunčevom sistemu bili izloženi kosmičkom bombardovanju vekovima, rasprava je konačno okončana.
     Čim su počeli da ih traže - naročito uz pomoć kamera postavljenih na orbitu - geolozi su stali posvuda da pronalaze kratere nastale od udaraca meteorita. Razlog zašto nisu bili mnogo češći sada je postao sasvim jasan: sve one nastale u davnini uništile su meteorološke prilike. A pojedini su bili u toliko ogromni da se naprosto nisu mogli videti sa tla, pa čak ni iz vazduha: njihova veličina mogla je biti obuhvaćena samo iz svemira.
     Sve je to bilo krajnje zanimljivo geolozima, ali suviše daleko od svakodnevnih zbivanja da bi uzbudilo širu javnost. A onda je, zahvaljujući dobitniku Nobelove nagrade Luisu Alvarezu i njegovom sinu Volteru, minorna nauka o meteoritima iznenada izbila u prvi plan.
     Iznenadni - bar na astronomskoj vremenskoj skali - nestanak velikih dinosaurusa, pošto su vladali Zemljom više od sto miliona godina, oduvek je predstavljao jednu od najvećih tajni. Ponuđena su mnoga objašnjenja, neka uverljiva, a neka, iskreno rečeno, smešna. Najjednostavniji i najočigledniji odgovor glasio je: promena klime - i on je nadahnuo jedno od klasičnih umetničkih dela - veličanstvenu sekvencu 'Prolećni obred' u remek-delu Volta Diznija Fantazija.
     Međutim, to objašnjenje nije bilo zadovoljavajuće jer je nametalo više pitanja nego što je pružalo odgovora. Ako se klima promenila - šta je uzrokovalo tu promenu? Bilo je toliko teorija, od kojih nijedna nije izgledala baš mnogo uverljiva, da su naučnici počeli da traže odgovor na drugom mestu.
     Godine 1980. Luis i Volter Alvarez su, istražujući geološke nalaze, objavili da su konačno rešili staru tajnu. U jednom uskom sloju stene, koji je obeležavao granicu između doba krede i tercijera, pronašli su dokaze o globalnoj katastrofi.
     Dinosaurusi su bili pobijeni: a znali su i šta ih je pobilo.