each ethnic group, each culture."
"To deliberately kill billions-"
"We would not be killing. We would merely supply the opportunity for people to die. Which particular individuals would die would depend on the particular biochemistry of those individuals. It would be the finger of God."
"And when the world discovers what has been done?"
"That will be after our time," said Affare, "and by then, a flourishing world with limited population will thank us for our heroic action in choosing the death of some to avoid the death of all."
Dr. Rodman felt himself flushing, and found he had difficulty speaking. "The Earth," he said, "is a large and very complex lifeboat. We still do not know what can or can't be done with a proper distribution of resources and it is notorious that to this very day we have not really made an effort to distribute them. In many places on Earth, food is wasted daily, and it is that knowledge that drives hungry men mad."
"I agree with you," said Mare coolly, "but we cannot have the world as we want it to be. We must deal with it as it is."
"Then deal with me as I am" You will want me to supply the necessary LP molecules-and I will not do so. I will not lift a finger in that direction."
"Then," said Mare, "you will be a greater mass murderer than you are accusing me of being. And I think you will change your mind when you have thought it through."
He was visited nearly daily, by one official or another, all of them well fed. Rodman was becoming very sensitive to the way in which all those who discussed the need for killing the-hungry were themselves well fed.
The National Secretary of Agriculture said to him, insinuatingly, on one of these occasions, "Would you not favor killing a herd of cattle infected with hoof -and-mouth disease or with anthrax in order to avoid the spread of infection to healthy herds?"
"Human beings are not cattle," said Rodman, "and famine is not contagious."
"But it is," said the Secretary. "That is precisely the point. If we don't winnow the overcrowded masses of humanity, their famine will spread to as yet unaffected areas. You must not refuse to help us."
"How can you make me? Torture?"
"We wouldn't harm a hair on your body. Your skill in this matter is too precious to us. Food stamps can be withdrawn, however."
"Starvation would harm me," surely."
"Not you. But if we are prepared to kill several billion people for the sake of the human race, then surely we are ready for the much less difficult task of withdrawing food stamps from your daughter, her husband, and her baby."
Rodman was silent, and the Secretary said, "We'll give you time to think. We don't want to take action against your family, but we will if we have to. Take a week to think about it. Next Thursday the entire committee will be on hand. You will then be committed to our project and there must be no further delay."
Security was redoubled and Rodman was openly and completely a prisoner. A week later, all fifteen members of the World Food Council, together with the National Secretary of Agriculture and a few members of the National Legislature, arrived at his laboratory. They sat about the long table in the conference room of the lavish research building that had been built out of public funds.
For hours they talked and planned, incorporating those answers which Rodman gave to specific questions. No one asked Rodman if he would cooperate; there seemed no thought that he could do anything else.
Finally Rodman said, "Your project cannot, in any case, work. Shortly after a shipment of grain arrives in some particular region of the world, people will die by the hundreds of millions. Do you suppose those who survive will not make the connection and that you will not risk the desperate retaliation of nuclear bombs?"
Affare, who sat directly opposite Rodman, across the short axis of the table, said, "We are aware of that possibility. Do you think we have spent years determining a course of action and have not considered the possible reaction of those regions chosen for winnowing?"
"Do you expect them to be thankful?" asked Rodman bitterly.
"They will not know they are being singled out. Not all shipments of grain will be LP-infected. No one place will be concentrated on. We will see to it that locally grown grain supplies are infected here and there. In addition, not everyone will die