"Asimov, Isaac - Cleon the Emperor" - читать интересную книгу автора (Asimov Isaac)

УSurely it doesn't take Psychohistory to point out these possibilities.Ф

УThe interesting thing is that there seems a mutual exclusivity. One or the other. The likelihood of both together is very small. Here! Look! It's your own mathematics. Observe!Ф

They bent over the Prime Radiant display for a long time.

Seldon said finally, УI fail to see why the two should be mutually exclusive.Ф

УSo do I, Hari, but where's the value of Psychohistory if it shows us only what we would see anyway? This is showing us something we wouldn't see. What it doesn't show us is, first, which alternative is better, and second, what to do to make the better come to pass and depress the possibility of the worse.Ф

Seldon pursed his lips, then said slowly, УI can tell you which alternative is preferable. Let the Periphery go and keep Trantor.Ф

УReally?Ф

УNo question. We must keep Trantor stable if for no other reason than that we're here.Ф

УSurely our own comfort isn't the decisive point.Ф

УNo, but Psychohistory is. What good will it do us to keep the Periphery intact, if conditions on Trantor force us to stop work on Psychohistory? I don't say that we'll be killed, but we may be unable to work. The development of Psychohistory is on what our fate will depend. As for the Empire, if the Periphery secedes it will only begin a disintegration that may take a long time to reach the core.Ф

УEven if you're right, Hari, what do we do to keep Trantor stable?Ф

УTo begin with, we have to think about it.Ф

A silence fell between them, and then Seldon said, УThinking doesn't make me happy. What if the Empire is altogether on the wrong track, and has been for all its history? I think of that every time I talk to Gruber.Ф

УWho's Gruber?Ф

УMandell Gruber. A gardener.Ф

УOh. The one who came running up with the rake to rescue you at the time of the assassination attempt.Ф

УYes. I've always been grateful to him for that. He had only a rake against possibly other conspirators with blasters. That's loyalty. Anyhow, talking to him is like a breath of cool wind. I can't spend all my time talking to court officials and to Psychohistorians.Ф

УThank you.Ф

УCome! You know what I mean. Gruber likes the open. He wants the wind and the rain and the biting cold and everything else that raw weather can bring to him. I miss it myself sometimes.Ф

УI don't. I wouldn't care if I never went out there.Ф

УYou were brought up under the domeЧbut suppose the Empire consisted of simple unindustrialized worlds, living by herding and farming, with thin populations and empty spaces. Wouldn't we all be better off?Ф

УIt sounds horrible to me.Ф

УI found some spare time to check it as best I could. It seems to me it's a case of unstable equilibrium. A thinly populated world of the type I describe either grows moribund and impoverished, falling off into an uncultured near-animal level; or it industrializes. It is standing on a narrow point and falls over in either direction, and, as it happens, almost every world in the galaxy has fallen over into industrialization.Ф

УBecause that's better.Ф

УMaybe. But it can't continue forever. We're watching the results of the over-toppling now. The Empire cannot exist for much longer because it hasЧit has overheated. I can't think of any other expression. What will follow we don't know. If, through Psychohistory, we manage to prevent the fall or, more likely, force a recovery after the fall, is that merely to insure another period of overheating? Is that the only future humanity has, to push the boulder, like Sisyphus, up to the top of a hill only in order to see it roll to the bottom again?Ф