Mike Resnick - Birthright

“Unharmed,” said Consuela.

“Of course. My dear Mrs. Orta, what kind of monsters do you take us for?” “If you'll be polite enough to take me back to the ship to await the alien, I'll be polite enough not to answer your question.”

Tanayoka sighed, returned Consuela to her quarters aboard the spacecraft, and issued orders to capture

one of the aliens. Two hours later he knocked on her door and informed her that her subject was in the brig, awaiting her pleasure.

When she arrived, she found an inhabitant of Beelzebub pacing back and forth like a caged animal, which it indeed resembled. She pulled up a chair and sat down to observe it. The alien uttered a loud hooting sound, glared at her for a moment, and then resumed its pacing. “The jaw's built all wrong,” said Consuela. “It must ingest by suction. It couldn't possibly have any teeth.”

“Are you a physiologist as well as a psychologist?” asked Tanayoka. “A little of both. Our field has come a long way since it was concerned with why husbands strayed from the fold.”

“Touché!” said the little man. “I notice that it has well-articulated thumbs on its hands. Wouldn't that imply some intelligence? I mean, you need thumbs to build machines, and so on.” “There are still some apes and monkeys in captivity on Earth,” said Consuela. “They have thumbs, but they've reached an evolutionary dead end, and hence haven't developed the power of abstract thought.” “What kind of dead end?”

“They're herbivores,” explained Consuela. “Thus they have no need to do anything with their hands except peel bananas. There is no environmental need for them to think.” “Surely you're not suggesting that only carnivores can develop intelligence!” said Tanayoka. “What about the Butterballs of Gamma Leporis IX, or the—” “You misunderstand me,” said Consuela “Being carnivorous has nothing to do with developing intelligence. In point of fact, only a very small percentage of sentient races spring from carnivores. Most meat-eaters evolve physical means of catching and killing their prey. What I said was that environmental need creates intelligence. Man developed it because he weighed about a hundred pounds and was trying to kill half-ton herbivores for dinner. No amount of physical equipment could have helped him. Other races develop intelligence for other reasons of need. However, many of them—most, in fact—get sidetracked somewhere along the way. Like the monkeys, for example.” “Then how can you tell if our alien here is intelligent?” “I intend to ask it,” said Consuela.

“How? You don't know anything about its language.” “It's quite possible that we have a language in common. May I have the loan of some paper and a pen?” Tanayoka sent for them, and a moment later she was carefully drawing a right triangle and writing Pythagoras's theorem beneath it.

“What makes you think it has the slightest acquaintance with the square of the hypotenuse and its

relatives?” asked Tanayoka.

“It's a pretty universal theorem,” said Consuela “I expect it is just as true on Beelzebub as on Earth.” She passed the paper through the bars to the alien. It looked at the figures, contorted its mouth into a snarl, and ripped the paper to shreds. Three more attempts brought forth the same results. “Obviously it's not geometrically inclined,” said Consuela. “I'm going to try some simple binary equations next, but technology is usually the forerunner to a knowledge of the binary system, and there's been no evidence of any technology on this world, so I rather expect our friend here to give this the same treatment.” The creature ripped up five sheets of paper before Consuela put her pen and paper aside with a sigh. “Nonmathematical,” she said. “Or noncooperative. Probably the latter.” “Unintelligent?” asked Tanayoka tentatively. “Not necessarily. I have a son who could never make change, and now he's a newsman of some renown. His math is still absolutely abominable, but I hardly consider him unintelligent.” “I'm beginning to get an appreciation of the problems involved in your line of work,” said Tanayoka with a grim smile. “It has also occurred to me that it may know perfectly well what you're doing, but feels obligated to offer you nothing but its name, rank, and serial number.” “That's quite possible,” she agreed, without ever taking her eyes off the alien. “And as a whole, psychology is coming up with about sixteen percent successes,” said Tanayoka “I'm amazed that you come up with even one percent!” “Well, you can do a lot with percentages,” said Consuela. “Usually the Republic considers us successful if we discover their weaknesses. Understanding them takes a little more work.” She paused, looking at the alien for a long minute. “Has it had any water since it was captured?”

“Not to my knowledge,” said Tanayoka “Good,” said Consuela. “Let's see if we can't set up a little reward situation.”

With the aid of some of the crew members she set up two transparent boxes, each containing a jiggerful of water. One box had an untreated red top, the other a blue top that emitted a mild electrical charge when touched. Then she heated up the room and raised the humidity until everyone in it, human and alien alike, was feeling uncomfortable.

The alien was then presented with the two boxes. It immediately opened the one with the blue top. “Some of us just aren't born lucky,” said Consuela, as the alien drank the half-ounce of water within the box. The boxes were removed, the missing water replaced, and they were offered to the alien again. This time it chose the red box.

It chose the blue and the red in order the next two times, and Consuela turned to Tanayoka.

“By now it should know which one is loaded,” she said. “Let's start switching them around.” After thirty tries, the alien had chosen the blue box twenty-seven times. “Some of us were just born dumb,” commented Tanayoka. “Not so,” said Consuela. “An unthinking animal would get the right box fifty percent of the time, probably even more. Take my word for it, our friend knows the difference.” “Then why did it purposely shock itself almost every time?” “Maybe it feels good. This isn't a human physiology we're dealing with.” “So is it intelligent?”

“More than a laboratory mouse,” said Consuela. “That's all I can tell you today. Let's cool the room off and give it something to eat.”

They left the brig area, and Consuela asked to be taken to the mining site once again. “I'm having a little difficulty understanding why the aliens took no action against the miners the whole time they were extracting and refining the minerals,” she said, her eyes scanning the landscape. “It would seem more sensible for them to attack the moment the miners began stripping the mountains.” “Maybe they wanted to make sure the ore was being removed before they committed themselves,” suggested Tanayoka.

She shook her head. “There's no sign of any technology on this planet. They couldn't know what a refining operation was for, so why did they wait?” “Does it make that much of a difference?” asked Tanayoka. “Certainly. If I can come up with a reason as to why they didn't mind raw materials being taken but objected to refined ore, that would prove they were intelligent.” “In what way?”

“Because, having no experience with refined ore, they would have had to extrapolate, by abstract thought, the uses to which it might be put.” “But why would they disapprove?”

“It doesn't matter. The mere fact that they could form a chain of reasoning that would lead to disapproval would be sufficient to prove they were sentient. Don't ask me to psychoanalyze their racial consciousness in twenty days. If I can show you they're intelligent, that ought to be enough to keep the Republic from annihilating them.”