The Omega Expedition - Brian Stableford [172]
After issuing a conventional warning against the hazards of teleological thinking, Davida admitted that there was a sense in which the whole purpose of a human body was sexual. Central to the fundamental philosophy of its design was the production of eggs or sperm, and the development of physiological and behavioral mechanisms for bringing the two together in a manner conducive to the eventual production of more egg or sperm producers. There was, she conceded, an arguable case for the contention that sexuality was so fundamental to humanity that it might be regarded as its very essence, even after the universal sterilization caused by the plague wars had put an end to live births.
On the other hand, she was quick to add, the most important years of human development were unquestionably those prior to puberty. By the time a human being became sexually functional, the foundations of the personality had been laid. Then again, the human mind also continued to function — and had done even in Adam Zimmerman’s day — long after sexual function had declined to negligibility, albeit in an increasingly robotic manner. Given these facts, Davida contended, one could also argue that the essence of human individuality was quite unconnected with sexuality.
That was exactly what she did go on to argue.
Davida asserted that the gift of personality and individual self-consciousness was, in fact, a transcendence of and hard-won triumph over sexuality, which had had to be won in early childhood precisely because the anti-intellectual effects of the sexual impulse were so drastic.
The essence of post humanity, Davida went on to assert, was the diminution of the sexual impulse that had begun with the release of the chiasmalytic transformers and had arrived at its climax in Excelsior. Within her worldview, the kind of sexuality provided by natural selection and the kind of individuality that had been shaped by conscious desire and determination were opposed forces. The only viable route to true personality was a complete negation of the “natural” sexual impulse and the “natural” sexual apparatus. This was not so say, however, that these products of natural selection were any less capable of modification than the other anatomical and biochemical feature she and her kind had found wanting. She conceded immediately that the emotional apparatus of her own kind was not, in the strictest sense, “sexual” at all, but contended that it was a far better generator of desire, affection, loyalty, and love than ancient sexuality had ever been.
It occurred to me as she unfolded her argument that an audience of ultrasmart machines might well find it very easy to agree with her. Whatever emotional apparatus they had, it was certainly not a relic of brute sexuality.
I also reminded myself that the mind of Excelsior itself might be right there beside me, albeit in a spun-off version that had left its parent in place and intact. Rocambole was manifesting himself to me as a man much like myself, but if I had guessed his true identity the closest kinship he had to any kind of posthuman being was surely to Davida and the sisterhood. Even if I had not, there must be plenty of others listening in who would be prepared to acknowledge that kind of kinship.
“When the theory of evolution was first propounded in the nineteenth century,” Davida Berenike Columella said, by way of summation, “Benjamin Disraeli said that it was a debate as to whether man was an ape or an angel. In that, he was correct. He also said that he was on the side of the angels — but that claim was utterly mistaken. He, like his opponents, was firmly and irrevocably on the side of the apes. The real question before him, although he did not realize it, was not what had happened in the past but what might happen in the future, when human beings would be able to take charge of their own evolution. I and my kind are the first posthumans who have ever been able to say with complete confidence that we are on the side of the angels.
“That opportunity is now open to you, Mr.