[Feb. 4, 1960] Nurturing Nature (The First Men, by Howard Fast)

[galacticjourney]

How do you attract the intelligent fan? Why, appeal to her/his sense of mental superiority, of course. Science fiction magazines do it all the time; The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction is particularly fond of showcasing the brainy cultured notables who have subscriptions. There is some justification to this conceit. After all, science fiction (at least the literary kind) tends to be the province of the creative, the egg-headed. The ideas are, by definition, innovative and sometimes revolutionary, and it follows that an oversized brain is required to understand them.

Howard Fast's lead novella in this month's issue of F&SF, The First Men, seems a conscious nod to this concept. Its premise: just as normal humans raised in the wild by animals have a stunted intellectual growth that cannot be remedied once they reach maturity, exceptional humans (geniuses) are stunted by the straight-jacketing society into which they are born. This society is designed to accommodate the average person, thus the wunderkind does not develop to her/his full potential. In Fast's story, some far-sighted folk decide to create a new isolated society designed to enable geniuses, identified at infancy, to fully flower into the next level of humanity.



It's a compelling notion, isn't it. How many of us clever folk have felt stifled and underapplied throughout life? In school, in work, in social situations, we find insufficient challenge and our faculties atrophy. Of course, many of the bright figure out how to use their talents to get ahead, but is it enough simply to do better than others at games for dullards?

What keeps this story from greatness are the fundamental flaws with the premise and the implementation. For instance, the old fable about only using 10% of our brains is trotted out, much to my dismay. But setting that aside, how can a group of admittedly normal folk be sure to find the optimal way to hatch a new race of unfettered geniuses? And what guarantee do we have that they will be, as happens in the story, be utterly benevolent? I think Golding's Lord of the Flies is a better signpost than Ballantyne's The Coral Island, frankly.

Also, it seems that the Israeli kibbutz is the inspiration for the ideal society depicted in the story. It may be too early to tell, but it seems that the kibbutz, a sort of commune, may not be the paradise it seems to be. The second generation of kibbutzniks is coming of age, and many are dissatisfied with the socialism, the provincialism, and the overfamiliarity that comes with living in an isolated village. Moreover, these young adults have been raised in common with all the other kibbutz kids, without individual parents (as is the norm on the kibbutz, and in The First Men). This causes them to see their fellow kibbutzniks as siblings rather than potential mates, and they feel they must leave home to marry. For all of these reasons, some are predicting that the kibbutzim (plural of kibbutz) will not survive as an institution past this generation, much to the dismay of the idealists who founded them. By extension, I feel Fast's commune is similarly doomed.

Finally, the tale does not end happily, which left me with a bad aftertaste, perhaps more so as we smart readers are supposed to identify with this budding race of liberated humanity. For all these reasons, I have to give the story no more than three stars.

However, as Oklahoma Senator Mike Monroney is fond of saying, "your mileage may vary."

The rest of the issue in a couple of days!

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Comments

[laurose8]

If it's any consolation, I think the children were meant to have picked up enough antifirepower in those three years, so they could defend themselves and others.

Actually, I read this as starting out to be, very basically 'If you give your kids total love and care they will amaze you'. Which I agree with.

But he seems to have got rather carried away with his picture of superhumanity. Better than Nietzche's, anyway; as 'it' probably would be more altruistic and co-operative, but in a mammalian way. But it would have been more convincing - less unconvincing - if they had been showing dealing with differences. (It's not very relevant that I think Golding's book shows kids already thoroughly enculturated.) The idea of kids not wanting to learn values and philosophy from adults, and smoothly taking the designated adult because they know more physics (at a ridiculously early age) doesn't go down very well with me. It surprised me to read that Fast does have kids. But the set up had already weakened my suspension of disbelief; I won't tire you with the weak points there.

[galacticjourney]

I like to think we've raised our daughter in an unconventional household and that, as a result, she is smarter and more mature than she might otherwise have been, but how can we know?

[stardreamer]

I don't think Lord of the Flies is a fair comparison. That society was both totally without adult guidance, and composed of children who had already absorbed the bully-based structure of the English public schools. This story would have a completely different (though equally isolated) environment, and I think it's reasonable to expect a different outcome.

The thing that strikes me as a bit unbelievable is the ability of the children to perform at a completely adult level as early as age 5 or thereabouts. There are physical maturation issues in the human brain as well as social ones, and raw intelligence is not the only quality necessary for learning.

What Fast does get absolutely right is the likely reaction of the outside world to the existence of these "super-human" children. Anger, fear, the idea that their very existence is a terrible threat that must be exterminated -- all of that rings very true. And I agree that those attempts will be fruitless; the children have advanced sufficiently to be able to protect themselves now.

Clarke looked at a similar situation in Childhood's End, although that one occurred under the guidance and protection of the Overlords, and he explicitly says that the rest of humanity simply lost hope -- and all interest in living -- after the apotheosis of the children. But in that instance, it happened all at once; there was never any chance for the normal-humans to stop it, even if the Overlords had been willing to let that happen. This situation is more like the establishment of an alien-invasion colony on Earth, and is being treated similarly by the existing authorities. But I think it's already too late for them to stop the process.

[galacticjourney]

Fair enough. I do think Piaget is full of it. Kids can absorb far more at a young age than most think. I've had a 5-year old beat me at chess. My daughter understood algebra in Kindergarten.