Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 41 — page 111: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION barrel, all that they knew, and could sort it all out for its own use. The progress of the race —socially, technically and psy- chologically—would be in- credibly accelerated. But there would be com- plications. Children were self- centred and ruthless. They might, all too easily, acquire material knowledge without the moral awareness and judg- ment that came only with age and experience. It might not work out like that, but then again it might. A child might be only too ready to despise its parents after having rooted about in their minds and sorted out what was useful to itself, discarding the rest as so much unworthy junk. Gavin looked at his son. And Russ looked back, a plump-featured boy of four, with a mature and disturbing smile chasing in and out of the corners of his mouth. Before the ceremonial mo- ment when he ejected his personal consciousness and allowed it to be dissipated, never to be reclaimed, the High Predictor made a routine check of all the records that had been under his immediate jurisdiction. He was satisfied with Antares and amused by the solemnity of the Alpha Centauri experiment. He turned to the small charts of development on that one inhabited planet in the system that had, for a short time, captured his fancy. And he murmured: “Surely not. No, that seems most improbable.”’ The Acolyte studied the converging lines and uttered the equivalent of a cry. ‘Something strange there,” said the High Predictor. ‘‘Our computors must have made an error.” ““Have they ever been known to make an error?” demanded the Acolyte, impertinently. The High Predictor ignored him. He turned his attention back to the Earth, at which he had not glanced for over ten years now. Down he went, seeking out the family whose existence depended on that whim of his. There they were. Gavin Doust and his wife—still in love. And still happy? Yes, in their way, despite the un- 110 comicloooks.conrn