AMPHISBAENA 199 



Sperm cf dead geniuses has already been proposed by eminent 

 authorities. Two Uttle Einsteins in every middle class household, 

 what a vista! 



o: 



But can the centipede survive under a duodecimal system? The 

 more you talk about breeding geniuses the less Hkely you are to 

 get them. 



y: 



Again one of your unscientifically mystical remarks. I only 

 mentioned this proposal as a first modest feeler into the great 

 future. Later on, we shall be able to look up the nucleotide 

 sequence of every DNA; and each purine and pyrimidine will 

 have a number; and we shall know of each what happens when 

 we change it. And boy, will we change it! 



o: 



And then you will get the real "human engineering". Once you 

 can alter the chromosomes at will, you will be able to tailor the 

 Average Consumer, the predictable user of a given soap, the 

 reUable imbiber of a certain poison gas. You will have given 

 humanity a present compared with which the Hiroshima bomb 

 was a friendly caster egg. You will indeed have touched the 

 ecology of death. I shudder to think in whose image this new 

 man will be made. 



y: 



Well, you may not be around to see it. Anyway, it was nice to 

 have talked with you. I must still run up to the lab to turn off 

 the Spinco. 



