Contact - Carl Sagan [75]
"Faith, inspiration, revelation, awe," Rankin answered. "Don't judge everyone else by your own limited experience. Just the fact that you've rejected the Lord doesn't prevent other folks from acknowledging His glory."
"Look, we all have a thirst for wonder. It's a deeply human quality. Science and religion are both bound up with it. What I'm saying is, you don't have to make stories up, you don't have to exaggerate. There's wonder and awe enough in the real world. Nature's a lot better at inventing wonders than we are."
"Perhaps we are all wayfarers on the road to truth," Joss replied.
On this hopeful note, der Heer stepped in deftly, and amidst strained civilities they prepared to leave. She wondered whether anything useful had been accomplished. Valerian would have been much more effective and much less provocative, Ellie thought. She wished she had kept herself in better check.
"It's been a most interesting day, Dr. Arroway, and I thank you for it." Joss seemed a little remote again, courtly but distracted. He shook her hand warmly, though. On the way out to the waiting government car, past a lavishly rendered three-dimensional exhibit on "The Fallacy of the Expanding Universe," a sign read, "Our God Is Alive and Well. Sorry About Yours."
She whispered to der Heer, "I'm sorry if I made your job more difficult."
"Oh no, Ellie. You were fine."
"That Palmer Joss is a very attractive man. I don't think I did much to convert him. But I'll tell you, he almost converted me."
She was joking of course.
CHAPTER 11
The World Message Consortium
The world is nearly all parceled out, and what there is left of it is being divided up, conquered, and colonized. To think of these stars that you see overhead at night, these vast worlds which we can never reach. I would annex the planets if I could; I often think of that. It makes me sad to see them so clear and yet so far.
-CECIL RHODES Last Will and Testament (1902)
From their table by the window she could see the downpour spattering the street outside. A soaked pedestrian, his collar up, gamely hurried by. The proprietor had cranked the striped awning over the tubs of oysters, segregated according to size and quality and providing a kind of street advertisement for the specialty of the house. She felt warm and snug inside the restaurant, the famous theatrical gathering place, Chez Dieux. Since fair weather had been predicted, she was without raincoat or umbrella.
Likewise unencumbered, Vaygay introduced a new subject: "My friend, Meera," he announced, "is an ecdysiast-that is the right word, yes? When she works in your country she performs for groups of professionals, at meetings and conventions. Meera says that when she takes off her clothes for working-class men-at trade union conventions, that sort of thing-they become wild, shout out improper suggestions, and try to join her on the stage. But when she gives exactly the same performance for doctors or lawyers, they sit there motionless. Actually, she says, some of them lick their lips. My question is: Are the lawyers healthier than the steelworkers?"
That Vaygay had diverse female acquaintances had always been apparent. His approaches to women were so direct and extravagant-herself, for some reason that both pleased and annoyed her, excluded-that they could always say no without embarrassment. Many said yes. But the news about Meera was a little unexpected.
They had spent the morning in a last minute comparison of notes and interpretations of the new data. The continuing Message transmission had reached an important new stage. Diagrams were being transmitted from Vega the way newspaper wire photos are transmitted. Each picture was an array raster. The number of tiny black and white dots that made up the picture