"Geoffrey Landis - Ecopoiesis" - читать интересную книгу автора (Landis Geoffrey A)

acid oceans had been once more neutralized-- and the atmosphere was thick, fully
half a bar of carbon dioxide, enough for a greenhouse effect warm enough to keep
the new oceans liquid year round.
Mars had been triggered.
But how to keep this new atmosphere, to keep the planet warm? Not even Joseph
Smith Kirkpatrick could keep a volcano erupting forever, and already the Witch's
Tit was settling down from an untamed explosion of ash to a sedate mound of
slowly-oozing lava.
Joseph Smith Kirkpatrick's answer was bacteria. Anaerobic bacteria, to live in
the oxygen-free atmosphere of Mars.
"Sewer bacteria," I said.
"You got it, Tinkerman. Anaerobic bacteria-- modified sewer organisms. Yeasts,
slime-molds, cyanobacteria, methanogens and halophiles as well; but all in all,
bacteria closer to gangrene than to higher life."
"No wonder it stinks." I shuddered. "They were crazy."
"Not so. They were, in fact, very clever. They engineered a whole anaerobic
ecology. The bacterial ecology darkened the surface, taking over the job of the
volcanic ash. It burrowed into the rocks and broke them apart into soil,
releasing adsorbed carbon dioxide in the process. The methanogens added methane,
a vitally important greenhouse gas, to that atmosphere, and raised the
temperature another few degrees. They didn't dare establish too many
photosynthetic forms, of course, because if the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere
were to be converted into oxygen, the greenhouse effect that kept the planet
warm would vanish, and the planet would return to its lifeless, frozen state.
"But terraforming Mars hadn't been their goal in the first place; in fact,
terraforming was the very antithesis of what they intended. Their goal was
ecopoiesis, the establishment of an ecology. They were Darwinists, and diversity
was their creed. They looked down in contempt on unimaginative humans who
believed that humans were the pinnacle of creation; they saw humanity as only
agents of life, spore-pods by which life could jump from one world to another.
They believed that once life, however primitive, could establish a toe-hold on
Mars, it would adapt to its environment, and flourish, and someday evolve. Not
to make a copy of Earth, but into something new, something indigenously
Martian."
"So they wanted to be gods."
Leah shook her head. "They wanted to be men."
"So they're responsible for this place. Great."
"The ecopoiesis was a wonder in its day, Tinkerman. It spawned debate across the
Earth and cis-lunar space: was this the greatest feat of engineering in history,
or was it a crime against nature? The year of arguing at Freehold Toynbee was
nothing compared to the cyclonic fervor that was released when Joseph Smith
Kirkpatrick proudly announced to the Earth what they had done.
"Kirkpatrick was kidnapped from Toynbee and put on trial in Geneva as an
eco-criminal. The question the High Court argued was, Do Rocks Have Rights? Can
it be a crime to destroy an ecosystem that contains no life? The trial took
three years, and ended in a hung jury. Kirkpatrick was eventually acquitted of
all charges, but he was never allowed to leave the Earth again, and died an
angry, bitter man.
"Freehold Toynbee claimed ownership of Mars, and passed a law making it illegal
for any human to land on it for the next billion years--but nobody paid any