Illegal Alien

Dr. Penney placed the two pieces of the lostartd disk on Hask’s desk. "Dale and Frank have brought me here to ask you some questions, Hask."

"If you must," said the alien.

"Hask," said the psychiatrist, "do you know the difference between right and wrong?"

"They are opposites," said Hask.

"What is right?" asked Penney.

"That which is correct."

"So, for instance, two plus two equals four is right?" said Penney.

"In all counting systems except base three and base four, yes."

"And, in base ten now, two plus two equals five is wrong, correct?"

"Yes."

"Do the words right and wrong have any other meaning?"

"Right also refers to the direction that is to the south when one is facing east."

"Yes, yes. Right on its own has other meanings, but the concept of ‘right’ and ‘wrong,’ do they apply to anything other than factual matters?

"Not in my experience."

Penney looked briefly at Dale, then turned back to Hask. "What about the terms ‘good’ and ‘bad’?"

"A food item that has an agreeable taste is said to be good; one that has putrefied is said to be bad."

"And what about the concepts of moral and immoral?"

"These apparently have to do with human religion."

"They have no bearing on Tosok religion?"

"Tosoks believe in predetermination — we do the will of God."

"You believe in a single God?"

"We believe in a single being that was foremother to our race."

"And this God — she is good?"

"Well, she has not begun to putrefy."

"You perform no actions that are not the will of your God?"

"The God."

"Pardon?" said Penney.

"It is not acceptable to speak of God possessively."

"Sorry. You perform no actions that are not the will of the God?"

"By definition, such a thing would be impossible."

"Is there a devil in your religion?"

Mask’s translator beeped. "A — devil? The word is unfamiliar."

"In many Earth religions," said Frank, once again leaning against the wall, "there is a supremely good being, called God, and an adversary, who attempts to thwart God’s will. This adversary is called the devil."

"God is omnipotent," said Hask, looking briefly at Frank, then turning back to Penney. "Nothing can thwart her."

"Then there is no continuum of behavior?" asked the psychiatrist.

"I have encountered this concept repeatedly in human thought," said Hask. "The idea that everything moves from one extreme on the left to another on the right, or that there are two equal ‘sides’ to every issue — using the word ‘sides’ in a way a Tosok never would." His topknot moved. "This is an alien way of thinking to me; I rather suspect it has something to do with the left-right symmetry of your bodies. You have a left hand and a right, and although each individual among you seems to favor one— Frank, I have noticed you favor your right, but Dale, you favor your left — in general, you seem to view the hands as equal. But we Tosoks have a front hand that is much stronger than our back hand; we have no concept — to use one of your words that does not translate fully — of what you call ‘evenhandedness.’ One perspective is always superior to the other; the front always takes precedence over the back. The aspect with the preponderance of power or weight is the side of God, and it always wins."

Frank smiled. Clete would have loved that kind of biology-based answer.

"Let me ask you some hypothetical questions," said Penney. "Is it all right to steal?"

"If I do it, God certainly must have observed it, and since she did not stop me, it must be acceptable."

"Is it all right to kill?"

"Obviously, God could prevent one from doing so if she wished; that she does not clearly means the killer must have been acting as her instrument."

Penney’s eyebrows went up. "Are there any unacceptable actions?"

"Define unacceptable."

"Unacceptable: acts that cannot be countenanced. Acts that are not reasonable."

"No."

"If you killed someone because he was trying to kill you, would that be acceptable?"

"If it happened, it is acceptable."

"If you killed someone because he was trying to steal from you, would that be acceptable?"

"If it happened, it is acceptable."

"If you killed someone because the joke they told was one you had already heard, would that be acceptable?"

"If it happened, it is acceptable."

"In our culture," said Penney, "we define insanity as the inability to distinguish moral acts from immoral acts."

"There is no such thing as an immoral act."

"So, by the definition of the human race, are you insane?"

Hask considered this for a moment. "Unquestionably," he said at last.

Frank, Dale, and Dr. Penney walked out of the residence hall and ambled across the USC campus, passing by the statue of Tommy Trojan and then cutting diagonally across Alumni Park. It was an overcast January day.

"We’re not going to sell that insanity defense, are we?" said Frank.